
Class _T1A 
Book 



COFk'RIGHT DEPOSIT. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMH-LAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



A TEXT-BOOK FOR SURVEY 
STUDENTS 



BY 
R. W. CAUTLEY, D.L.S., B.C.L.S., A.L.S. 

LATE SURVEYOR TO THE LAND TITLES OFFICE AT EDMONTON 



COLUMBIA BOUNDART COMMISSION 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1913 

All rights reserved 






Copyright, 1913 

By the MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Set up and electro typed. Published December, 1913. 



/^^ 



d-<) 



©C!.A357n99 



INTRODUCTION 

Title to land is based upon the description 
contained in the deed conveying it. It is not 
enough that the boundaries should be accurately 
surveyed: the land itself must be so described 
in the deed as to identify it without ambiguity 
and beyond any possible doubt. The importance 
of a precise description is enhanced when the 
boundaries are partially or wholly unsurveyed: 
it must then be so bounded that all the surveyors 
who may be employed in laying out the boundaries 
shall find identical lines if their operations are 
conducted with accuracy, and that the land lying 
between the lines so located shall be the particular 
piece of land which the parties to the deed are 
intending to deal with. A surveyor who is draft- 
ing a description must be able to express what he 
wishes to say in sentences that will admit of only 
one interpretation; he must have a clear concep- 
tion of what he has to describe, of the surveying 
operations involved and of the exact meaning of 
the words he is using, as interpreted by judicial 
decisions. 

The writing of descriptions cannot be governed 
by absolute rules. Whether a piece of land should 



vi INTRODUCTION 

be described by adjoiners, or by land marks or 
by the courses and length of the boundaries de- 
pends upon a variety of circumstances: when in 
doubt the surveyor should be guided by legal 
advice. While it is true that most lawyers are 
quite ignorant of the most elementary principles 
of surveying, it is equally true that few surveyors, 
if any, are able to understand the intricacies of a 
complicated title. The cooperation of surveyor 
and lawyer is necessary. 

One of the blessings of the Dominion Lands 
System of Survey is that descriptions generally 
assume such a simple form that the average sur- 
veyor should have no difficulty in writing them 
if he will only take the trouble to conform to a 
few rules. 

In the pages which follow Mr. R. W. Cautley 
has endeavored to formulate these rules: his 
experience as a surveyor in active practice for a 
number of years and subsequently as Surveyor 
to the Land Titles Office at Edmonton having 
given him exceptional opportunities, his views on 
the questions involved are especially valuable. 

E. Deville. 



PREFACE 

While there are a great many standard works 
on the subject of conveyancing, they deal, for 
the most part, with the legal aspect of the subject, 
with which a survey student has nothing to do. 
At the same time all survey students in Canada 
are required to pass an examination on '^Descrip- 
tions of Land,'' which is one important branch 
of the subject of conveyancing. I have therefore 
written the following text-book in the hope that 
it may prove useful in helping survey students 
to get up the subject for their examination, and — 
what is far more important — to realize the im- 
portance of the subject, and, by further study of 
it, to become capable of filling a more useful 
position as a surveyor in after life. Writing 
descriptions of land is essentially a branch of sur- 
veying and every complicated description should 
be drawn by an authorized surveyor. Unfor- 
tunately a great many surveyors are satisfied 
with obtaining proficiency in field work, as the 
most important and lucrative part of surveying, 
and do not take the trouble to become proficient 
in description writing, draughtsmanship, survey 
law or any other kindred subject once they have 

vii 



viii PREFACE 

obtained their commission. I venture to saj' that 
any surveyor, having just acquired his commis- 
sion, who will devote a year or two to acquiring 
a knowledge of office work and general business 
methods in a department of the Government, in 
the land department of a railway system or in the 
employ of any corporation having extensive deal- 
ings in land, will find that the knowledge so ob- 
tained will open to him a wider field of oppor- 
tunity that will more than compensate him for 
the increased earnings which he might have had 
by undertaking field work at once. 

In studying this subject it is important to note 
the close connection between the practice of sur- 
veying, the writing of descriptions of land and a 
knowledge of the laws governing registration of 
land titles. It is absolutely essential that any 
surveyor who undertakes to write descriptions of 
land in any given province must first have a 
knowledge of the Real Property Act in force in 
that province. 

6th July, 1913. 
Edmonton, Alberta. 



CONTENTS 

Section Page 

Descriptions based on actual survey 1-2 1 
Descriptions must refer to plans of 

RECORD 3 7 

Plans and how to refer to them, 

General 4-5 9 

Departmental Plans 6 11 

Subdivision Plans 7-9 13 

Explanatory Plans 10-17 16 

Railway Plans 18-19 23 

Use of natural boundaries in descrip- 
tions 20-25 27 

Use of words "more or less*' in de- 
scriptions 26-29 34 

Use of bearings in descriptions 30-39 37 

Description of remainders 40-42 48 

Description by exception 43-47 54 

Description of railway right of way 48-50 59 

Exception of minerals in descriptions 51 68 

Interpretation OF FAULTY DESCRIPTIONS 52-53 71 

Forms of preaivible 54 75 

Examples, Description of: — 

city lot with appurtenant easement . 55 76 

partition of two city lots 56 77 

part quarter section ! . 58 82 

part bounded by right of way 59 84 

ordinary right of way 49 60 

right of way by metes and bounds . . 60 85 

additional right of way 62 87 

interior parcel of quarter section ... 15 18 

ix 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



All Descriptions of Land must be Based on 
Actual Survey. 

1. Since the ownership of land is the most 
universal and, at the same time, the most per- 
manent form of property, it follows that convey- 
ancing of land constitutes the most common and 
important class of transactions in the everyday 
business of the world. 

The term ^^ conveyance of land'' includes all Meaning of 
documentary instruments purporting to deal ve™nce^of' 
with the ownership of land, whether by way of land.", 
absolute sale or transfer, transmission, agreement 
of sale or lease. 

Every conveyance of land may, for the present 
purpose, be regarded as consisting of two essential 
parts; first, that which defines the relation be- 
tween the parties to the document as to their 
respective interest in the land, and secondly, 
that which defines the actual position and extent 
of the land itself. The first of these two parts 
is a matter of drawing up a legal document, and 
should generally be done by a lawyer: — with it 

1 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



Description 



we have nothing to do here. The second involves 
the description of land and forms the subject of 
this text book. 

2. To begin with the fact must be recognised that 
must be based ^jj descriptions of land must be based upon a 

on survey. 

survey of the land in question, and the establish- 
ment on the ground of recognisable points by 
which the land described may be identified. 
Such points may be either corners of a mathe- 
matical survey marked on the ground by the 
establishment of posts or other survey monu- 
ments, or they may be topographical features of 
the country. In the former case, since the points 
are arbitrarily determined, it is essential that the 
lines which connect them should be mathemati- 
cally surveyed. In the latter this is not essential 
for purposes of conveyancing unless it is desired 
to include in the conveyance precise information 
as to the area and measurements of the land 
conveyed. 

For instance, when two Indian chiefs wanted 
to determine the boundaries of their respective 
hunting grounds, they did so by reference to a 
range of hills and an intersecting river — points 
of the landscape which were patent to their eyes 
and capable of identification by their tribesmen — 
and in so doing made an actual survey of the 
country. 

Again, after the North- West Rebellion in 1885 



Description 
by natural 
boundaries. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 3 

the Government of the Dominion of Canada is- 
sued land scrip to veterans and half breeds for a 
certain specified quantity of land in the North- 
West Territories, the position of which was unde- 
fined in the scrip and left to the choice of the 
holder. This scrip was exchangeable for as much 
real property as the number of acres mentioned 
in it; at the same time the land could not be con- 
veyed until the owner of the scrip had located it 
according to the Government's own surveys and 
received a patent for it from the Crown. In other 
words the scrip could be sold as a chattel but the 
land which it represented could only be conveyed 
after it had been defined in reference to surveys 
on the ground. 

Of course the above rule — that all descriptions Descriptions 
must be based on actual survey — is capable of ™^^ ^ ^ ^ 

•^ ^ on remote 

secondary application. It is not essential that survey, 
all the comers of a parcel of land which it is de- 
sired to describe should be marked on the ground. 
It is not even necessary that any of them should 
be so marked. What is essential is that the exact 
position of each such comer shall be so described 
in relation to the position of some point that is 
surveyed and marked on the ground, and of some 
line of known direction starting from said point, 
that it shall be capable of being accurately and 
unambiguously defined on the ground. To take 
a very simple example, it is of course possible to 



4 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

describe and convey a parcel of land containing 
ten acres out of the interior of a quarter section 
by describing the ten acres in reference to any 
comer and adjacent side of the quarter section. 
As a further example it is only necessary to refer 
to the Dominion Lands Act 1908, which expressly 
provides that any quarter section shall be deemed 
to be surveyed when any two of the comers have 
been established. 
Description The most extreme cases of land being described 

in reference to '^-^ reference to known points outside the land it- 
lines of lati- , , 
tude or longi- Self are those in which boundaries are described 

tude. as unsurveyed lines of latitude or longitude. In 

these cases the real reference is the Greenwich 
Observatory in England and the local meridian 
at that point, although usually there are many 
subsidiary points and lines of reference established 
by previous survey much closer to the projected 
line than Greenwich. For instance, the North 
boundary of the Provinces of Saskatchewan and 
Alberta has been defined as the 60th parallel of 
North latitude, and the West boundary of Al- 
berta, is, in part, the 120th Meridian of West 
longitude, none of these being actually defined 
on the ground. In these cases, however, the 
rights of possession guaranteed by a title based 
on a line of latitude or longitude cannot be fully 
enjoyed by the owner, or enforced against possible 
trespass, until such time as the line is actually 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 5 

defined on the ground. The story of the Hudson's 
Bay Company's Post on the Yukon River affords 
a good illustration of this point. Many years 
ago the common boundary between that part of 
the North- West Territories now known as the 
Yukon Territory and Alaska — a territory of the 
United States — was defined as the 141st Meridian 
of West longitude. In 1847 the company estab- 
lished a trading post at Fort Yukon at the Junc- 
tion of the Yukon and Porcupine Rivers, but, 
when the first surveys of the country were made, 
it was found that the longitude of Fort Yukon was 
approximately 145° 20' West, and its latitude 
66° 34' North, so that the fort was about 120 
miles due West of the British American boundary, 
and within American Territory. As a result the 
company's post was moved Easterly to a point 
on the Porcupine River which was East of the 
boundary, and was named Rampart House, in 
1869 or 1870. 

Before leaving this phase of the subject it may Descriptions 
be stated as a fact that, in all ordinary cases, and ^°°^ °^ ^^^ 

according to 

provided it is correct in other respects, a descrip- proximity of 
tion of land is good or bad in inverse ratio to the survey on 
distance of the land described from the points of are based, 
reference in regard to which it is described. In 
other words, that description is best in which the 
point of commencement at least is referred to as 
being actually defined on the ground, and the 



6 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

worst form of description is that in which the 
connection between the point of commencement 
of the land described and the points of reference 
in relation to which it is described is long, com- 
plicated and obscure. 

The following reasons may be given for the 
above statement: — 

(a). A description should always be made as 
simple and direct as possible. 

(&). A description does not fulfil all its purposes 

until the land described has been identified on 

the ground, and although a description based on 

a survey at some distance from the land described 

may be perfectly sufficient for the purpose of 

conveying the said land it necessitates a survey 

before the land can be identified and is, to that 

extent, incomplete. 

Description (c). A description of land the boundaries of 

tual^ ositio^' '^hich are described as being between certain 

of points on posts or other monuments on the ground is bound 

ground. ^y. ^-^^ actual position of such posts or monuments, 

and thus any errors of distances or bearings given 

in the written description are absorbed by the 

survey on the ground. 



Descriptions Should Refer to Plans of Survey 
Which are of Record, as well as to the 
Survey Itself. 

3. Having seen that all descriptions of land Descriptions 
must be based on actual land surveys — near or re- ^]^^^ ^f^^ *^ 

^ ^ plan of 

mote — it is very important to realize that de- survey, 
scriptions should always refer to a plan of the sur- 
vey registered in some public office of the State, 
as well as to the actual lines and monuments on 
the ground. There are several reasons for this, 
of which the following are perhaps the most im- 
portant : — 

(a). A survey on the ground cannot be brought Reasons why 
within the comprehension of any person interested ^descriptions 

must refer to 

in the land, except the surveyor who has made plan of sur- 
the survey, until it has been plotted in plan form ^^y- 
on a convenient scale. If you take a man out on 
the prairie and tell him that you are standing at 
about the centre of a piece of land having certain 
measurements and containing a specified acreage, 
he can only be convinced in so far as his faith in 
your knowledge of the facts and your personal 
integrity will carry him. If, on the other hand, 
you are able to show him a plan of the same land, 
with the various measurements shown on it and 
bearing on its face the affidavit of a State au- 

7 



8 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

thorized land surveyor and the signatures of the 
owner and the public official whose duty it is to 
keep such plan as a matter of public record, he 
is at once able to realize the position and extent 
of the land for himself. 

(6). It is impracticable for all the principals, 
or their agents, who have to deal in land to visit 
any given parcel of land, or to have it resurveyed, 
every time they desire to ascertain anything in 
regard to it. 

(c). A plan duly registered in a place of public 
record tends to do away with any chance of the 
actual survey on the ground being tampered with 
by interested parties. 

(d). Many surveys become obliterated alto- 
gether in process of time, either by decay or up- 
rooting of the monuments or by fire, so that a 
conveyance of land in which the land is described 
in reference to posts planted in the ground would, 
if such posts were entirely obliterated, often 
become valueless, whereas any proper plan of 
survey contains information from which it would 
be possible to reconstruct the survey on the 
ground in such a case. 

(e). No registrar of land titles, under the 
Torrens system of land titles which obtains in 
all the Western Provinces of Canada and to a 
certain extent in Eastern Canada, can properly 
issue certificates of title based on facts of survey 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 9 

which are not a matter of record in his o^\^l office. 
Since monuments on the ground can never be 
matters of office record it follows that a plan of 
every survey must be made and registered before 
such survey can be accepted by a registrar as an 
authentic fact on which to base descriptions of 
land for registration purposes. 

The foregoing paragraphs may be summarized 
by stating that all references to surveys to be 
made in descriptions of land should be made to 
plans of such surveys in order that they may 
be intelligible, accessible for purposes of verifi- 
cation, better established and valid for registra- 
tion. 

4. The description of a surveyed parcel of land Advantages 
which is based on, and made subject to, a plan of ° ^ p ^^ of 

' J 7 jr survey con- 

the survey is described partly in the written sidered as a 
words of the description and partlj^ by the lines ^description, 
and measurements shown on the plan. A sufficient 
plan of survey constitutes a graphically drawn 
description of the parcels of land shown on it. A 
graphically drawn description possesses these 
advantages over a written description, (a) that 
the more intricate points of the survey are ren- 
dered capable of being visually realized by inspec- 
tion, and (6) that the mathematical process of 
plotting the survey on a plan serves as a check 
against errors which may easily be made and un- 
discovered in a written description. 



10 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

Definition of 5. A plan of suFvey that is ^^ sufficient'^ for 
a "sufficient" ^j^^ purpose of conveving land by reference to it 

plan of sur- ^ ^ i . , r n • 

vey. niay be defined as having the following attributes: 

(a). That it is a plan of an actual survey made 
upon the ground and marked on the ground in 
such a way that the parcels of land surveyed may 
be capable of identification. 

(&). That it is made by a surveyor authorized 
by law to make such a survey. 

(c). That the survey and plan are made in ac- 
cordance with the provisions of any law affecting 
the making of such survey or plan, as to the 
method of survey employed, the marking of the 
survey on the ground and the execution of the 
plan by the surveyor, the registered owner and 
any other person required to execute the same 
under the said provisions. 

(d). That the plan is of record in the public 
office wherein such a plan is required to be regis- 
tered by the law in that behalf. 



Plans and How to Refer to them in Descriptions 

of Land. 

Departmental Plans 

6. The most important class of plans are those importance 

issued by the departments of the Government of f^ represent- 
ing original 

the original surveys of different parts of Canada, surveys. 
The great importance of these plans arises from 
the fact that they are the plans of the surveys on 
which all original grants from the Crown have 
been based, and therefore on which all subsequent 
title to land depends. Owing to the fact that the 
original surveys were not always made carefully, 
it has been found necessary in a great many in- 
stances to have certain sections of the country 
resurveyed, and new plans of the corrected survey 
issued, so that it is quite usual to find two, and 
even three, departmental plans of the same town- 
ship having different measurements and acreages 
shown on them. 

All these plans are of record in the office of the Where of 
Department by whose authority they were issued, ^^^°^^- 
and also in the Land Titles Office for the district 
in which the land occurs. They are usually iden- How identi- 
tified in descriptions that are based on them by ^^^' 

11 



12 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

reference to the date of the official approval of 
the survey which they represent. 
Examples. Two examples are given below of the way in 

which departmental plans may be referred to in 
descriptions of land : — 

(a). The whole of the South East quarter of 
Section 1 in Township 54 and Range 23 West of 
the 4th Meridian in the Province of Alberta in 
the Dominion of Canada containing 160 acres 
more or less and as the same is sho^\Ti on a plan 
of survey of said township approved and confirmed 
by the Surveyor General of Canada at Ottawa 
on the 14th day of May, 1894, which plan is of 
record in the Department of the Interior at Ottawa 
and in the Land Titles Office for the North Alberta 
Land Registration District at Edmonton in said 
Province. 

(6). The whole of the fractional South West 
quarter of Section 6 in Township 51 and Range 24 
West of the 4th Meridian in the Province of Al- 
berta in the Dominion of Canada containing 39 
acres more or less and as the same is shown on a 
plan of survey of part of the said township being a 
subdivision of part of the Papaschase Indian 
Reserve made by A. Nelson, Dominion Land Sur- 
veyor and signed by him at Ottawa on the 29 th 
day of March, 1892, which plan is of record in 
the Department of Indian Affairs at Ottawa and 
in the Land Titles Office for the North Alberta 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 13 

Land Registration District at Edmonton in said 
Province. 

Note. — The second form is not so good as the 
first, but it will be found that some of the earlier 
plans were admitted to record without endorse- 
ment by the head of the department, and exam- 
ple (6) is supposed to represent a case of this kind. 



Subdivision Plans 

7. A second class of plans which are very im- 
portant, because of the value of the land which 
they represent and the great number of convey- 
ances that are based on them, is that of City or 
towTisite plans of subdivision. 

The object of these plans is to facilitate the Object of sub- 
transaction of all kinds of business having to do division plans. 
with city or town lots. 

These lots consist of small parcels of land 
which it would not be practicable to deal with as 
independent parcels described in reference to the 
outlines of the original land survey on account 
of their number, the number of transactions that 
take place in regard to them and the fact that 
it is constantly necessary to identify the position 
of the land occupied by each lot. 

It is quite usual for a quarter section, contain- 
ing 160 acres, to be subdivided into 1,000 town 
lots, with streets and lanes. This often results 



14 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

in thousands of persons acquiring an interest in 
small portions of the quarter section, either as 
o\^Tier, mortgagee, lessee or tenant, and in endless 
complications of title. 
Subdivision 8. In Order to meet the foregoing conditions 
plans spe- ^j| Resil Property Acts contain provisions that 

cially pro- 
vided for in have the following general effect, although they 

Real Property yQ^ry considerably in scope and treatment: 

A.cts 

(a). That an owner desiring to create a town- 
site on his property may register a plan of sub- 
division of the same, showing the blocks and lots 
designated by numbers or letters, the position 
of streets, lanes, parks, etc., and all necessary 
measurements. 

(&). That upon the registration of such a plan 
he may proceed to sell or otherwise deal with the 
town lots shown thereon by reference to the regis- 
tration marks of the plan and the numbers or 
letters shown on the plan to designate such lots. 
Registration 9. On the registration of a plan of subdivision 
o su ivision yj^^jgj, ^]^^ Torrens system of land titles the owners' 

plan causes ^ ^ ^^ 

change in title is changed in form from a title based on the 
form of title, original land survey to a title to lots and blocks 
based on the plan of subdivision. For instance 
in the case of a man owning a quarter section of 
land within the limits of an incorporated city 
and presenting for registration a plan of subdivi- 
sion of the entire quarter section, his title to the 
quarter section — as such — would be cancelled in 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 15 

full and he would receive in exchange a new Once a plan 
title for all the lots shown on the plan. It follows °^ subdivision 
that descriptions of lots, or parts of lots, in a city property 
or townsite must always be based on the registered shown on it 
plan of subdivision, and that, after the registra- described in 
tion of such a plan, it is wrong to attempt to de- reference to it. 
scribe them in any other way. Take the supposed 
case of Lot 1 m Block 13 situate in the town of 
Orwell and being part of the South East quarter 
of Section 1 in Township 46, Range 23 West of 
the Fourth Meridian as shown on a plan registered 
in the district land titles office under number 2079 
in Day Book Q. A good and sufficient description 
of the above lot would be as follows: — ''Lot num- 
bered One (1) in Block numbered Thirteen (13) 
in the Town of Orwell in the Province of Alberta 
as the same is shown on a plan of survey regis- 
tered in the Land Titles Office for the North Al- 
berta Land Registration District under number 
2079 in Day Book Q.^' 

But suppose it is merely described as ''Lot 
numbered One (1) in Block numbered Thirteen 
in the Town of Orwell being part of the South 
East quarter of Section One (1) in Township 
Forty-six (46), Range Twenty-three (23) West 
of the Fourth (4th) Meridian," this is insufficient 
for the following reasons: — 

(a). There is no certificate of title in existence 
which corresponds with and can be identified with 



16 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

the terms of the description. The description 
contained in the Certificate of Title for this lot 
is based on plan 2079 Q, which defines its size and 
relative position. 

(6). There may be, and experience shows that 
there frequently is, an unregistered plan which 
shows Lot 1 Block 13 to be in an entirely different 
position and which, nevertheless, was the plan 
which the parties to the sale or agreement had 
agreed upon. 

Explanatory Plans 

Purpose of ex- 10. A third class of plans are those which are 
^lans^^^^ drawn for the express purpose of accompanying 
and elucidating particular descriptions of land, and 
which are attached to and form part of such de- 
scription. For the purpose of distinguishing them 
from departmental plans or subdivision plans, 
they will be referred to as ^^explanatory plans.'' 
Provided for 11. Most of the Real Property Acts in Canada 
in Real Prop- provide that a Registrar may require any person 

erry acts. 

desiring to register an instrument containing a 
complicated description of land to furnish him 
with an explanatory plan, signed by an authorized 
surveyor, and to make the description in the in- 
strument subject to the plan by embodying a 
direct reference to the plan in the instrument 
itself. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 17 

12. The object of an explanatory plan is to Effect of ex- 
attach to a description which is not of a nature to P^^^^^^ry 

plans. 

be capable of comprehension by the Registrar, or 
his staff, the weight of evidence afforded by a 
plan of survey certified to be correct by a surveyor 
whom the Government has found worthy to 
receive a Commission as such from the Crown 
and who has done the work necessary to prove 
the correctness of the description. 

13. An explanatory plan, and the survey which 
it represents, add a great deal to the cost of con- 
veyancing, so that there is a constant tendency on 
the part of lawyers to save their clients money by 
evading the necessity of having a plan made. The 
question therefore arises as to what constitutes a 
complicated description. As the answer to this Definition of 
question generally lies in the discretion of the ^ complicated 

T^ . . . ., , .11 description. 

Registrar, it is only possible to consider the sub- 
ject in a general way. Any description may be 
said to be complicated, the facts of which cannot 
be grasped when it is read through by a man who 
is accustomed to such work. Further, any descrip- 
tion in which it is necessary to make a trigono- 
metrical calculation in order to prove the cor- 
rectness of the various courses, or to plot the said 
courses in order to prove the correctness of the 
acreage specified, is complicated within the mean- 
ing of the term as applied here. 

14. Explanatory plans are not registered as 



18 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

How regis- independent instruments, as are plans of sub- 
tered. dlvision, but are merely attached to the instru- 
ment of which they are really a part, and must 
be referred to accordingly. For example: — ^^ — 
and as shown colored red on a plan of survey 
attached to an instrument registered in the 
Land Titles Office for the Land Reg- 
istration District under number in Day 

Book /^ 

15. As explanatory plans are intended to ac- 
company a description of a particular parcel of 
land it only becomes necessary to refer to them 
in descriptions affecting the same land. That is 
they are plans of special record affecting one par- 
ticular parcel of land instead of being plans of 
general record affecting many different titles, as 
in the case of a departmental plan or a plan of 
subdivision. Moreover, whereas a departmental 
plan is usually a plan of an original survey, and a 
subdivision plan is one that has been accepted 
in lieu of such plan of original survey, so that, in 
either case, all titles which are based on them de- 
pend directly on the plan itself and the survey 
which it represents, this is not the case with ex- 
planatory plans. 
Explanatory Explanatory plans can only be used to accom- 
secondary^ ^ P^^Y ^ description of a part of one of the larger 
base of de- parcels shoAvn on a plan of general record, and 
scnption. ^^y ^j^j^ issued on such a description depends, 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 19 

first, on the plan of general record, and, second- 
arily, on the explanatory plan. 

Hence it is sometimes held that a description 
accompanied by an explanatory plan must in- 
clude in the text a full written description of the 
lands by metes and bounds, as well as the refer- 
erences to the plan of general record and the ex- 
planatory plan, as in example (a) given below. On 
the other hand it is very common practice to 
make the description depend directly on the ex- 
planatory plan, as in example (6). 

My owTL opinion is that either form is correct 
providing the explanatory plan is a plan of ac- 
tual survey, duly certified by an authorized sur- 
veyor and sufficiently executed by the registered 
owner of the land. 

The advantage in Form (a) lies in the fact that 
a title issued on, and containing, such a descrip- 
tion is, to a large extent, self contained and com- 
plete, whereas a title issued in Form (6) cannot 
be understood without a certified copy of the 
explanatory plan or an examination of the original 
at the land registry office. 

The advantage in Form (6) is that it does away 
with any chance of a discrepancy between the 
written description and the plan — a serious error 
which is by no means uncommon. 

(a). ''AH that part of the South East quarter 
of Section twenty (20) in Township Forty-seven 



20 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

(47) Range Twenty-one (21) West of the Fourth 
(4th) Meridian as the same is shown on a plan 
of survey of the said Township approved and 
confirmed by the Surveyor General of Canada at 
Ottawa on the 14th day of May, 1894, of record 
in the Department of the Interior at Ottawa and 
in the Land Titles Office for the North Alberta 
Land Registration District at Edmonton in the 
Province of Alberta which may be more par- 
ticularly described as follows: — Commencing at 
an iron post planted at a point on the Southerly 
boundary of said quarter section distant six 
hundred (6000 f^^t more or less Westerly from 
the South East comer thereof, Thence Northerly 
and parallel to the Easterly boundary of said 
quarter section six hundred and sixty (660') feet 
more or less to an iron post planted, 

"Thence South forty-five degrees and no min- 
utes more or less West nine hundred and thirty- 
three decimal point two (933.2) feet more or less to 
an iron post planted on said Southerly boundary, 

"Thence Easterly and following said Southerly 
boundary six hundred and sixty (660') feet more 
or less to the point of commencement, 

"The part herein described containing five (5) 
acres be the same more or less and as shown 
colored red on a plan of survey of the same made 
by Alfred Jones, Dominion Land Surveyor and 
attached hereto/' 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 21 

(b), "All that part of the South East quarter 
of Section Twenty (20) in Township Forty -seven 
(47) Range Twenty-one (21) West of the Fourth 
(4th) Meridian as the same is shown on a plan 
of survey of the said Township approved and 
confirmed by the Surveyor General of Canada 
at Ottawa on the 14th day of May 1894 of record 
in the Department of the Interior at Ottawa and 
the Land Titles Office for the North Alberta Land 
Registration District at Edmonton in the Prov- 
ince of Alberta containing five (5) acres be the 
same more or less and as lettered "X^' and shown 
colored red on a plan of survey of the same made 
by Alfred Jones, Dominion Land Surveyor and 
attached hereto." 

Note. — The two above examples are intended 
to be embodied in an original transfer of the parcel 
described. In the title that would issue, and in 
all subsequent transfers, it would be necessary to 
substitute for the final word ^' hereto'^ the follow- 
ing — ^Ho an instrument registered in the said 

Land Titles Office under number in Day 

Book ." 

16. When referring to a registered plan or other important 
instrument in a description of land it is of the that reference 

- to plans shall 

utmost importance that the reference shall be identify 
made in terms that shall absolutely identify the same, 
plan or instrument referred to. To do this it is 
necessary to have some knowledge of the system 



22 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

System of Under which instruments are registered in different 
registration registry offices. The most general system of 

Qiscussed* 

registration is that in which instruments are 
registered according to the number given them 
in the current day book or journal, and the num- 
ber or letter given to said book to distinguish it 
from those that have already been filled and those 
of the future. For instance, take a day book 
containing room for 8,000 entries and known as 
Day Book ^^Q.'' Each instrument that is regis- 
tered is given the next unused number — say 
3679 — and henceforth becomes known for all pur- 
poses of registration as 'instrument registered 

in the Land Titles Office for the Land 

Registration District under number 3679 in Day 
Book 'Q.'^' or for informal reference, as plan, 
or document, '^3679 Q.'^ A very common mistake 
in ordinary practice is reference to an instrument 
by its registered number alone, as '^Instrument 
registered, etc., under number 3679.'' Since it 
will be seen that there are as many instruments 
registered in any registry office under any given 
number as there are completed day books, it is 
unnecessary to further establish the fallacy of 
this practice, particularly when it is understood 
that instruments are indexed and filed for refer- 
ence in a registrj^ office, in sequence of numbering, 
under the letter or number used to designate the 
particular day book that they were registered in. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 23 

17. In cases where it is practicable to see the Good practice 
Certificate of Title of, or including, the land which *° ""^'^ """l^^- 

iiig title when 

it is desired to describe, it is almost always good describing 
practice to follow the actual w^ording of the de- ^^^^ ^^^^• 
scription contained in the Certificate as far as the 
same is applicable. For one thing, except in the 
comparatively few cases where there is some- 
thing radically wrong about it, it will be accepted 
without question by the registrar. 



Railway Plans 

18. There is a fourth class of plans which may Nature of 
be referred to as Railway Plans, being plans of ^^ ^^^ ^ ^°^* 
surveys of railway right of way on which descrip- 
tions of land, and titles to the same, are based. 
Railway plans were called into existence by the 
provisions of various Railway Acts which have 
been passed by the Dominion and Provincial 
Legislatures. The object of these plans, as plainly Purposes of 
contemplated in the said Acts, is to give public ^^^^^^p^^^- 
notice of intention on the part of the promoting 
railway companies, first to the Government whose 
approval and sanction are necessary before the 
privileges granted to the company under its 
charter can be given effect to in respect of the 
proposed line, and secondly to the owners of all 
land through which the line passes. With a view 
to promoting the second of these objects, it is 



24 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

provided that railway plans shall be deposited in 
the land registry office for the district in which 
the land affected occurs. It followed that, be- 
cause these plans were of record in the local land 
registry offices, and because there was no other 
Why railway available base of description that was of record, 
plans ^^^^^^^^ they came to be generally recognized and accepted 
as a base of description for title to railway lands. 
Inferior char- Unfortunately the class of plans made under the 

acter of some •• txut)*! \ j. j ju 

railway plans P^^visions 01 the Railway Acts and approved by 
those who administer the said Acts as being suffi- 
cient for the purposes thereof, lack the essential 
characteristics which any plan intended to be 
used as a base of description for land titles should 
Wherein rail- possess. In the first place such a railway plan 
way plans not jg ^^^j ^ ^^^^ ^£ guryey in SO far as the actual 

••sufficient." . 

right of way is concerned; in respect to the land 
boundaries shown on such a plan it is merely a 
sketch, most of the ties shown on land boundaries, 
from the intersection of the centre line of the 
right of way to alleged corners of the parcel of 
land, being derived from calculation based on 
the assumption of a theoretically perfect original 
survey, or having been carelessly and incorrectly 
made. The serious feature of the above is that 
the survey of the right of way itself is not posted 
or marked on the ground in any way, and its 
existence as a matter of record depends on the 
spurious ties given on the plan. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 25 

Note. — Lest it should appear that this state- 
ment contains an exaggeration, I may say that 3 
years experience as a surveyor to a land titles office 
has shown me that whenever a subsequent and 
carefully made survey of land abutting on a rail- 
way right of way has been made, and a plan of 
same presented for registration, 'fully one half of 
the land ties shown on the railway right of way 
plan have been found to be incorrect — often 
grossly so. 

In the second place the survey represented by- 
such a railway plan is very rarely made by an 
authorized surveyor, but, generally, by a railway 
engineer whose whole interest in the work is 
centred in the actual right of way and who cares 
nothing whatever about the land connections 
thereof. 

In the third place the Government officials 
who pass upon railway plans can only require 
that they shall fulfil the conditions prescribed in 
the Railway Acts, which do not contemplate 
their being used as a basis of title. 

As a result, there are irmumerable faulty descrip- 
tions contained in right of way titles, which will 
all, eventually, have to be rectified at an immense 
cost. In recognition of this fact the Governments 
of the Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and 
Alberta have passed legislation refusing to issue 
titles to railway right of way until plans of a 
posted survey of the right of way, made by an 



tered. 



26 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

authorized surveyor in accordance with the pro- 
visions of the Provincial Surveys Acts, or, in the 
case of Manitoba, the Real Property Act, have 
been registered in the proper land titles office. 
How regis- 19. Since railway plans are plans of general 
record that affect the titles to all lands through 
which the railway is shown to pass, they are regis- 
tered as independent instruments and should be 
identified in descriptions of right of way by refer- 
ence to the registration marks of the plan. 

Owing to the fact that railway plans are de- 
posited in land titles offices as matters of record 
with a view to their future use as bases of descrip- 
tion whenever the railway company shall desire 
to acquire title to the right of way across any 
particular parcel of land shown thereon, and the 
further fact that they do not in any way affect 
the title to such land until so used, it is frequently 
the case that they are not registered in the com- 
mon register of instruments which have a direct 
and immediate effect on existing land titles, but 
are registered in a special register. Before under- 
taking to draw descriptions of railway lands, 
therefore, it is necessary to make careful enquiry 
as to the correct designation of the railway plan 
on which it is proposed to base the description. 



The Use of Natural Boundaries in Descriptions 

of Land. 

20. Natural boundaries include the high water Definition of 

mark of seas, lakes, or rivers, the centre line of ^^^^ '^^^' 

p 1 -11 ^^^^ bound- 

creeks and the foot or the top of hills. aries." 

21. In the case of lands fronting on seas, lakes High water 
or considerable rivers the high water mark is the ^^^^ ^^ ^^*f ^ 

^ ^ frontage only 

only proper boundary to adopt, the object being proper 

to ensure that the land shall include the water boundary to 

adopt. 

frontage and the high water mark being the only 

possible boundary having flexibility enough to 

allow for changes in the actual water front due 

to encroachment or recession of the water. It is H. w. M. 

bad practice to attempt to define the high water ^^^^|^ ^^^ ^^ 

. rigidly de- 

mark by mathematical survey in such a way as fined by sur- 

to preclude any change in the position of the ^^y- 
boundary whatever the water may do. Any sur- 
vey of a high water mark should be made only 
for the purpose of plotting the same or computing 
the area of land fronting on it, and not with any 
idea of rigidly defining the boundary of the land. 
For instance, let us consider the case of a frac- 
tional quarter section of land, containing 100 Example, 
acres and fronting on a navigable river with a 
swift current which is constantly cutting away its 

27 



28 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

banks on the one hand or forming new land on 
the other. Let us assume that the high water 
mark was accurately determined at the time of 
survey and that the said high water mark, tied 
in by offsets from properly connected traverse 
lines, was made the boundary of the quarter sec- 
tion as a surveyed line. First let us suppose that 
the river encroaches on the quarter section and 
cuts away 20 acres from it. This 20 acres, having 
become part of the bed of a navigable river, re- 
verts to the Crown. Thus we have an existing 
title for 100 acres of land while there are only 80 
acres within its described boundaries. Secondly 
let us suppose that the action of the river causes 
20 acres of land to form in front of the quarter 
section. The result is that, while the original 
100 acres are undisturbed, the land has lost its 
character as water frontage and, with it, much of 
its value. If the high water mark of the river, 
without any attempt at surveyed definition, had 
been used in the description the title would, at 
different times, have included anywhere from 80 
to 120 acres and the real intention of the original 
grant would, at all times, have been fulfilled. 
Area of land 22. Owing to the fact that the area of land 
renting on fronting on Water is liable to actual change in 

water should ^ ^ ^ ^ ^° 

be described extent, any specific acreage given in a description 
as "approxi- ^f^ ^j. ^ ^[^i^ ^^^ g^(.]^ ^^^^ should always be quali- 
fied by the use of the word ^^ approximately.^' 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 29 

For instance, ^'and containing approximately 
100 acres be the same more or less/' or ^^and 
containing approximately 100 acres as the same 
may be or may become/' 

It may be argued that the use of the words Use of words 
"more or less'' is sufficient to cover any possible "^^^^^^ 

less 3,3 tiP" 

variation of acreage, due to whatever cause. On plied to 
reflection, however, it will appear that the words ^^^^^sc- 
"more or less" are only intended to cover any 
variation of acreage due to error in computation 
of the area, and cannot be held to cover any 
actual change in the area itself. 

23. A high water mark that is sharply defined m defined 
is, as has been said, a very good natural boundary, ^^^^ ^^ ^^ 
but there is an immense amount of land which 
fronts on marshes that intervene between that 
which is indubitably land and that which is in- 
dubitably water. In such cases it is often im- 
possible to define the high water mark with any 
degree of precision. Even so it is all the more 
necessary to use the term "high water mark" and 
to rely on its flexibility of meaning under differ- 
ent circumstances. 

Any specification of acreage in a description of 
such a parcel should be : — 

(a). Expressed in terms giving the greatest 
possible latitude, or 

(6) . Omitted altogether, or 

(c). Described as containing so many acres of 



30 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

high land ^ together with all the low lying land 
lying within the above described boundaries/' — • 
of which ^Hhe high water mark'' is one. 
Centre of 24. The centre line of a creek may be a very 

^r^b^^nd^*" ^^^^ natural boundary in cases where the creek 
ary. has a well defined channel and is of a size to en- 

sure its permanency. 
Good in cases Even a small creek may make a good common 
where land is ^Q^n^^ary between two parcels of agricultural 
lands which are of small value, and there may be 
good reasons for adopting such a creek as a bound- 
ary which, while contrary to the best principles 
of good conveyancing, should nevertheless be 
taken into consideration. For instance, take the 
case of a quarter section with a creek running 
diagonally through it and having steep rough 
banks. From the point of view of working the 
land economically the two halves as divided by 
the creek would have a very much greater value 
than if they were divided by a straight line 
leaving small corners of arable land on either side 
of the creek. 
Why creeks In a city or town, however, the water which 
should not be g^^^^ j^ ^ g^^^jj ^^.^^j^ ^jjj eventually be absorbed 

adopted as ^ ^ ^ ^ *^ ^ 

boundaries into the municipal drainage system, while the 

m cities. |3g(j q£ ^^q creek will become diverted, excavated, 

filled in or otherwise obliterated. In the City of 

Winnipeg litigation over the question of what 

had been the true position of a small creek of this 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 31 

kind, the position of which had been obliterated, 
cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the 
same thing has occurred in regard to other cases 
elsewhere. 

Hence it may be accepted as a general rule General rule, 
that no small creek should ever be adopted as a 
common boundary between two parcels of land 
which have, or appear likely to have, a value 
above that of agricultural land. 

25. The use of the foot or top of hills as natural Hills must 
boundaries should always be avoided, on account ^dl^ted^as 
of their lack of definition and the possibility of natural 
change in their position, owing to slides or erosion t>oundaries. 
by water. It is often desirable to establish the foot 
or top of a hill as a land boundary, and this may 
very properly be done but such a boundary must 
in all cases be established as a surveyed line. For 
instance, the mining regulations which were in Example, 
force in the Klondike gold mining camp defined 
the most valuable class of claims — creek claims — 
as extending from ^'base to base of hill.'' As the 
country is of glacial formation, and what may at 
one time have been a sharply defined base of hill 
is generally overlaid with from 10 to 60 feet of 
slide matter, and as, moreover, the values in- 
volved were often enormous, the result was an 
endless succession of law suits on the interpreta- 
tion of this particular definition. The reason why 
the law suits were endless was that, owing to the 



32 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

impossibility of applying the theoretical provi- 
sions of the regulations to the actual conditions, 
each case had to be decided on its own merits and 
it was not possible to create precedents. In their 
efforts to render equitable decisions the Courts 
were obliged to listen to, and give consideration 
to, fictitious arguments as to where the base of 
the hill ought to be, rather than where it actually 
was.* 
Example. To take a more ordinary case: Some years ago 

the Northerly 40 acres of Lot 27 in the Edmonton 
Settlement was sold, described as follows: — '^AU 
that portion of Lot 35 in the Edmonton Settle- 
ment in the Province of Alberta containing 40 
acres more or less and lying to the North of a 
line drawn parallel to and distant three feet 
Southerly from the high bank of the North Sas- 
katchewan River.'' As the bank referred to is by 
no means sharply defined it is difiicult to imagine 
a more perfect example of a bad description. 
After a time the owners of the Southerly portion 
subdivided their land and the surveyor employed 
defined the above boundary by a straight line 

* I distinctly remember hearing a well known member 
of the Dominion Geological Survey give evidence to 
the effect that, in his opinion, the ^' base of the hill'' was 
half way up an adjacent mountain, basing his opinion 
on the probable position of said base of hill during the 
Pliocene Period. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 33 

boundary of two courses. The plan of subdivision 
was refused registration until the description was 
interpreted by an order of the Court, after all 
interested persons had been heard in the matter. 
In this case, therefore, a description based on the 
position of a hill top was found to be insufficient 
to define the boundary of the land described for 
purposes of legal occupation. 



Object of us- 
ing words 
"more or 
less." 



Surveying 
only a rela- 
tively exact 
science. 



The Use of the Words " More or Less " in 
Descriptions of Land. 

26. The words ^^more or less/' when appHed 
to a distance given for one of the courses in a 
description of land, are intended to cover any 
variation in such distance from that given which 
may appear on re-measurement or re-calculation. 

Theoretically speaking surveying is an exact 
science, but in practice it is only relatively so. 
Elements of personal exactitude and skill in mak- 
ing surveys, variations of temperature, slight 
inherent errors in the manufacture of measuring 
tapes and differences caused by variation of ten- 
sion in using them, all have their effect in making 
field surveying only relatively accurate. In 
describing a course between two actual points on 
the ground there can, of course, be only one cor- 
rect distance, but the conveyancer is not justified 
in assuming that the distance which the surveyor 
measured between these two points, and put on 
his plan, is exactly correct. Nevertheless it is 
the actual distance between the two points that 
he desires to describe, and he is not concerned that 
the distance given in the conveyance does not 
agree with such actual distance within the limits 

34 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 35 

of precision of the survey. Hence the use of the 
words ^^more or less/' For instance, let us take 
the following very simple example: — ^^Commenc- 
ing at a post planted; Thence due North 1,000 Example, 
feet more or less to an iron post and mound/' 

In the above example suppose the surveyor to 
have made an error in chaining the distance and 
that this distance is in reality 1004 feet. What is 
it that the conveyancer desires to describe? Is it 
1,000 feet of land, or the actual distance between 
the two posts? Why, the actual distance of course. 
But the description describes the course in two 
ways — first as being the distance between the two 
posts — and secondly as being 1,000 feet, (which 
latter is found by later and more accurate meas- 
urement to be wrong in that it is 1,004 feet in- 
stead of 1,000). Hence there is a confliction of 
evidence in the description as to the length of 
this course, which is overcome by the use of the 
words ^^more or less,'' but which, if the said words 
were omitted, would remain unaccountable. 

27. The rule is, therefore, that ^^ Every distance Rule when 
given in a description of land as representing the ^^\^^ „ °^^^^ 
actual distance between two points established should be ap- 
on the ground should be qualified by the words ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^" 

A ^ tances. 

'more or less'." 

28. In the two preceding sections we have Example, 
dealt with descriptions of surveyed parcels of 

land, but parcels of land which have not been sur- 



36 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

veyed are frequently described by metes and 
bounds, and referred to some more or less remote 
survey. The follo^^g may be taken as an ex- 
ample: — '^Commencing at a point on the South- 
erly boundary of the South East quarter of Sec- 
tion 20 in ToT^-nship 46, Range 23 West of the 
Fourth ]\Ieridian distant 660 feet Westerly from 
the South East comer thereof; Thence Northerly 
and parallel to the Easterly boundary of said 
quarter section 660 feet; Thence Westerly and 
parallel to said Southerly boundary 660 feet; 
Thence Southerly and parallel to said Easterly 
boundar}^ 660 feet ; Thence Easterly and following 
said Southerly boundary 660 feet to the point of 
commencement/' 

To qualify any of the distances given in the 
above example by the words '^more or less'' 
would be to render the description indeterminate 
and absurd. All the said distances, being purely 
theoretic and not subject to discrepancies of 
survey on the ground, are, and must be, as exact 
as the science of mathematics itself. 
Rule when 29. The rule is, therefore, that ''Every distance 
wor s more gj^,^^ j^^ ^ description of land which is not sub- 

or less must ^ ^ 

not be applied jcct to the position of points established on the 
to distances. gj.Q^j^(^ ^^gt never be qualified by the words 

"more or less." 



The Use of Astronomical Bearings in Descrip- 
tions of Land. 

30. The use of bearings in describing bound- Object of use 
aries of land is emploj^ed to define the direction of ^J beanngs m 

descriptions. 

such boundaries from their previously described 
starting point in relation to the meridian passing 
through such point, or such other meridian as 
they may be referred to. 

31. The reason why it is usual to describe the Why bearings 
direction of lines of survey by bearings rather P^^^^^^^ie to 

•^ '^ ° angular 

than by angular measurement with some con- measure- 
tiguous line of the survey is twofold. First, be- ^^^t^- 
cause to describe the direction of the lines of a 
survey in reference to the direction of the pre- 
ceding course must always be cumbersome and 
give more occasion for errors, both on the part 
of the person making the description and those 
w^ho subsequently have to interpret it, than if 
the method of description by bearings were em- 
ployed. Secondly, because the method of descrip- 
tion by bearings possesses the great advantage 
that the description of each line is independently 
described in regard to a constant line of reference 
ha\Tng a positive and a negative direction: — to 
'w^t, the local astronomical meridian, of which 

37 



38 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

the North Pole may be regarded as the positive 
end and the zenith of the point described as the 
negative end. This tends to the utmost facihty 
and lucidity of description because each line of 
which the bearing is given in a description repre- 
sents a definite and positive direction to the 
mind's eye of any person reading such description. 
Example. As an instance of this, and in order to show how 

difficult it is to make a clear description in which 
the method of angular measurement is used to 
define the direction of the various courses, the 
two following examples are given, in which the 
same parcel of land is described, (a) by employ- 
ing bearmgs to define the direction of its bound- 
aries, and (6) by employing angular measure- 
ments for the same purpose. The preamble, which 
is the same for both descriptions, is as follows: — 

^^AU that portion of the North East quarter of 
Section 23 in Township 46, Range 23 West of the 
4th Meridian in the Province of Alberta as the 
same is shown on a plan of survey of the said 
Township approved and confirmed by the Sur- 
veyor General of Canada at Ottawa on the 4th 
day of May, 1894, which plan is of record in the 
Department of the Interior and also in the Land 
Titles Office for the North Alberta Land Regis- 
tration District which may be more particularly 
known and described as follows: — '' 

(a). ^^ Commencing at an iron post planted at a 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 39 

point distant 10.73 chains more or less on a bear- 
ing of North 73° 25' West from a point on the 
Easterly boundary of said quarter section distant 
14.02 chains Southerly from the North East 
comer thereof; Thence North 73° 25' West a 
distance of 12.00 chains more or less to an iron 
post planted; Thence South 28° 02' West a dis- 
tance of 14.00 chains more or less to an iron post 
planted; Thence due East 16.00 chains more or 
less to an iron post planted; Thence North 13° 
06' East 9.18 chains more or less to the point of 
commencement the whole containing three and 
eighty-hundredths acres be the same more or less 
and as shown red on the plan of survey attached 
hereto.'' 

(6). ''Commencing at an iron post planted the 
position of which may be described as follows: — 
Commencing at the North East comer of said 
quarter section: Thence Southerly and following 
the Easterly boundary of said quarter section a 
distance of 14.02 chains to a point; Thence in a 
straight line making a deflection angle to the right 
with the last described course of 106° 35' a 
distance of 10.73 chains more or less to said iron 
post and point of commencement; Thence continu- 
ing in the same straight line as that described 
between said point and iron post a distance of 
12.00 chains more or less to an iron post planted; 
Thence in a straight line making a deflection 



40 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



Quadrant 
bearings 
should be 
used. 



angle to the left with the last described course of 
78° 38' a distance of 14.00 chains more or less 
to an iron post planted; Thence in a straight line 
making a deflection angle to the left with the last 
described course of 118° 02' a distance of 16.00- 
chains more or less to an iron post planted; Thence 
in a straight line making a deflection angle to the 
left with the last described course of 76° 54' a 
distance of 9.18 chains more or less to the point of 
commencement, the whole containing three and 
eighty-hundredths acres be the same more or less 
and as shown colored red on the plan of survey 
attached hereto.'' 

32. For general use in descriptions of land it is 
better to adopt quadrant bearings than bear- 
ings from the North meridian from 0° to 360° 
through East, South and West and back to North 
again. The reason for this is simply that quad- 
rant bearings are more commonly understood 
than the other, and descriptions should always 
be made as simple and universally intelligible as 
possible. 

33. In theory, all bearings given in a description 
of land as representing the actual direction of a 
line between two points established on the ground 
should be qualified by the words ^'more or less,'' 
applied to the number of degrees and minutes 
given in the bearing, in order to allow for possible 
discrepancies of survey and for the same reasons 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 41 

given in section 24 having reference to the qualifi- 
cation of distances between similar points. For 
instance, '^Commencing at a post planted; Thence 
North 41"^ 33' more or less West 1,000 feet more 
or less to an iron post and mound/' 

However, it is not usual to find this rule ob- Bearings do 
served, even in the best practice, and the reason °^* ^ ways 

' ^ ^ absolutely 

for this may be found in the fact that an astronom- govern direc- 
ical bearing, when used in a description of land, ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^* 
cannot be considered to absolutely govern the 
direction of the line described, but only to serve 
as a close indication of it. The principal reason 
for this is that the bearing of a line is usually given 
without specified reference to any particular 
meridian; it therefore fails to define the direction 
of the line, unless it is assumed as implied that 
the bearing is referred to the meridian of the 
point of commencement, which assumption would 
not, as a rule, be justified by the facts. For in- 
stance, suppose the bearing of a line to be given 
as North 45° 00' East, and that subsequent 
observation from the point of commencement 
reveals the fact that the actual bearing of the 
said line is North 45° 05' East. It is nevertheless 
a fact that the bearing of said line is North 45° 
00' East if referred to the meridian of a point 
about five miles East of the point of commence- 
ment. As a matter of fact, most of the bearings 
which occur in descriptions of land are derived 



42 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



Rule when 
bearings 
given in de- 
scriptions 
should be 
qualij&ed. 



Showing how 
bearings may 
be referred to 
special 
meridian. 



from those shown on the departmental plans of 
the original surveys, rather than from observa- 
tion. Further, the bearings shown on such de- 
partmental plans, with the exception of those 
shown for the central meridian of townships, are 
not themselves true astronomical bearings, but 
are referred, in accordance with a convention of 
the Dominion Lands Surveys Act, to said central 
meridian. It follows that the bearings given in 
descriptions of land would hardly ever bear the 
test of verification by observation, although most 
of them would be shown to be approximately 
correct, and that the whole question of the use 
of bearings in descriptions is established on a less 
accurate basis of survey than that of the use of 
distances. 

34. In a description of land in which the bear- 
ing given for any line, which is also defined as 
lying between two points established on the 
ground is referred to a specified meridian, the 
direction of the line is defined in two ways and 
such bearing should be qualified by the use of 
the words ^^more or less'' applied to the number of 
degrees and minutes given in the bearing. 

35. The bearings of lines of survey may be re- 
ferred to a specified meridian in descriptions of 
land in various ways, of which two are shown in 
the following examples, for both of which the 
following preamble will serve: — 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 43 

''All that portion of the North East quarter of Example. 
Section 23 in Township 46, Range 23 West of 
the 4th Meridian in the Province of Alberta as 
the same is shown on a plan of survey of the said 
Township approved and confirmed by the Sur- 
veyor General of Canada at Ottawa on the 4th 
day of May, 1894, which plan is of record in the 
Department of the Interior and also in the Land 
Titles Office for the North Alberta Land Registra- 
tion District which may be more particularly 
known and described as follows: — '' 

(a). '^Commencing at the South East corner 
of said quarter section; Thence North 45° 00' 
more or less West assuming the Easterly boundary 
of said quarter section to have a bearing of due 
North a distance of 1,000 feet more or less to an 
iron post planted/' 

Note. — In view of the fact that this book is in- 
tended to be a text book for the guidance of prac- 
tical survey students, I wish to say that, although 
I feel that the rule prescribed in section 34 is a 
logical and unavoidable deduction in the theory 
of description, it is one that is very rarely observed 
in common practice, and I do not know of its ever 
having been insisted upon by any Board of Ex- 
aminers or Master of Titles. 

(b), '^Commencing at the South East comer 
of said quarter section; Thence North 45° 00' 
more or less West which bearing and all other 



44 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

bearings given in the following description are 
derived from the bearing of the Easterly boundary 
of said quarter section as the same is shown on 
said plan a distance of 1,000 feet more or less to 
an iron post planted." 
When proper 36. It is Very usual in common practice to find 
to describe j^^^ described as "the North half/' or ''the East 

land as ' 

"North half/' of a parcel of land. When the boundaries 

half" of ^f ^Yie parcel are shown on the plan as being due 

original 

parcel. North, South, East and West, and the boundaries 

on the ground may reasonably be assumed to be 
very nearly so, there can be no objection to this 
practice, except that such a description is always 
subject to any discrepancy on the ground in the 
survey referred to, and, for that reason, a descrip- 
tion by metes and bounds is generally preferable. 

When im- jj^ ^ great many cases, however, the boundaries 

proper to 

describe land ^^ ^^^h a parcel are not due North, South, East 
as 'j North or West and then the description fails to express 
the true intent of the conveyance in ninety-nine 
cases out of a hundred, since there can be no 
doubt, as a matter of technical description, that 
Technical def- the North half of a parcel of land is all that part 
''North h If" ^^ ^^^^ parcel, being one half of the total area 
of a parcel of thereof, which lies to the North of a due East and 
land. West line bisecting such parcel, whereas, in al- 

most all cases, the intention is to convey a part 
which shall be bounded on the South by a line 
drawn parallel to and equidistant from the North- 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 45 

erly and Southerly boundaries thereof. This is 
most frequently found in descriptions of parts of 
city or town lots, and there are thousands of 
titles, in many registry offices, which are based 
on faulty descriptions such as the above, and 
which remain as a monument to the incompetence 
of the conveyancer and the examining staff of 
the registry office alike. However the general 
effect is not so serious as might be supposed; the 
intention of most of such titles is usually so mani- 
fest that it is accepted without question by the 
parties affected, or, if a dispute arises, it can 
generally be enforced by an order of a competent 
Court. 

37. The rule is — '^That no part of any original Rule when 
parcel of land should ever be described as the ^^^ be^ de- 
North, South, East or West part, as the case scribed as 
may be, unless such original parcel is quadri- ^o^th' etc. 
lateral and the boundaries thereof are due North 

and South or East and West.'' 

38. It is also quite common to find land de- Improper use 
scribed as 'Hhe Northerly one quarter '' of a parcel ?. J^^^u ^ i " 
of land. As the words '^Northerly,'' ''South- etc. 
erly," ''Easterly,'' and "Westerly" can only 
properly be used to indicate a general direction, 

and have no precise meaning, such a description 
is in the nature of a mere blunder. These words, 
used in the above sense, should never be used in 
any description of land. 



46 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



Magnetic 
bearings 
never to be 
used in de- 
scriptions of 
land. 



39. Magnetic bearings, or bearings that are 
derived from the Magnetic North Pole, should 
never, under any circumstances, be used in de- 
scriptions of land. One reason for this is that such 
bearings are incapable of being determined with 
a sufficient degree of precision — say within fifteen 
minutes. The chief reason, however, is that, for 
causes which have never been scientifically deter- 
mined, the Magnetic North Pole is not constant, 
but varies from day to day and from year to year. 
This variation has been recorded at Paris in 
France as extending from 113/^ degrees East of 
true North in the year 1580 to 223^ degrees West 
of true North in the year 1814 — a total variation 
of 34 degrees.* It follows that bearings derived 
from the Magnetic North Pole vary accordingly, 
so that a line, the magnetic bearing of which was 
determined as being Magnetic North 10 degrees 
East in the year 1800, might quite possibly have 
a bearing of Magnetic North 5 degrees West in 
the year 1900. That is to say that, if it was at- 
tempted to re-establish the said line on the ground 
in the year 1900 from a known point of commence- 
ment and in reference to the magnetic bearing 
recorded for it in the year 1800, it would be 15 
degrees in direction out of place. Therefore, 
since the principal object of a description of land 
is to establish a record from which it shall be 



Gillespies' Treatise on Surveying. Article 278. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 47 

possible to identify the described parcel on the 
ground, it will be seen that a description of land 
in which the direction of the various courses 
were referred to the Magnetic North Pole would 
fail to fulfil its purpose. 



Description of the Remainder of an Original 
Parcel of Land 

Definition of 40. '^An Original parcel of land'' may be de- 
term * O^js- fined, for the purposes of this article, as any sur- 
land." veyed parcel of land, considered as an undivided 

whole, for which a separate title exists. 
Definition of The remainder of an original parcel of land is 
term re- ^-^^^ ^^^ which remains after one or more parts 

mamder. ^ ^ ^ 

have been previously conveyed by description. 
A remainder 41. The description of a remainder depends 
subject to aU ^^^ ^^j ^^ ^^^^ Original title to the whole of the 

parts pre- *^ ^ ^ ^ ^ 

viousiy con- parcel of which it is a part, but must also be made 
veyed. subject to the description contained in any exist- 

ing title for the part, or parts, previously conveyed, 
and the rule may be stated as follows: — ''The 
Rule for de- description of a remainder of any parcel of land 

Bcription of a . •, i • j. r xt. • i • 

remainder ^^ust be expressed m terms ot the remainder, m 
such a way as to be subject to the description 
contained in any existing title for a part, or parts, 
of said parcel which has been previously con- 
veyed.'' 

Object of 42. The object of the above rule is to prevent 

confliction of description and title in conveying 
a number of small parcels of land by description 
out of what has been defined in section 38 as an 

48 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 49 

original parcel of land. Such confliction may as- 
sume the form of overlapping of adjacent bound- 
aries, or the creation of small strips of land be- 
tween such boundaries. It is generally caused by 
the acceptance as absolutely correct of the various 
measurements shown on plans of survey of the 
property, without allowing for the discrepancies 
to which all surveys are subject. 

This discrepancy of survey, and of plans of Discrepancies 
survey, has already been referred to in section 24. ^ ^^fZ^^ 
Its lack of absolute accuracy constitutes an in- taken into ac- 
separable feature of the practice of surveying, and ^^^^^ ^° ^^^^" 

ing descrip- 

is a fact which must be accepted as such by all tions. 
who have to describe land, and in the knowledge 
and constant consideration of which they must 
proceed. Its importance in relation to the de- 
scription of land can scarcely be over-estimated, 
or emphasized too strongly. For instance, a 
quarter section of land may be shown on a de- Example, 
partmental plan to be 40.00 chains square, and 
to contain 160 acres. We will suppose that the 
owner first sells ''the South half ^' of said quarter 
section ''containing 80 acres more or less'' and 
subsequently proposes to sell the remainder. In 
this case the remainder can only properly be 
described as "the North half of said quarter 
section, containing 80 acres be the same more 
or less'' since this is the only possible form of 
positive description that cannot conflict with 



50 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

the description of the South half previously 
conveyed. But quite frequently the purchaser 
demands a transfer for 'Hhe North 20.00 chains 
of said quarter section containing 80 acres be the 
same more or less.'^ Such a transfer generally is, 
and always should be, returned to him by the 
registrar of the district registry office as being 
unregisterable. Why? Because, in 99 cases out 
of 100, the measurements of the quarter section 
will not be found to be on the ground exactly as 
they are shown on the departmental plan. First 
let us suppose that the North and South bound- 
aries are each exactly 40.00 chains in length, but 
that the meridian outlines are each 40.50 in length. 
Then the first parcel sold — namely the South 
half — ^was 40.00 by 40.25 chains and contained 
81 acres, — the additional acres being accounted 
for in the original description by the use of the 
words ^^ more or less." If then the second transfer, 
describing the remainder as the North 20.00 
chains, be accepted by the registrar, there is left 
a strip of 25 links by 40.00 chains, containing 1 
acre of land, still left in the original title. But the 
registrar has no other source of knowledge in 
regard to the actual size of the quarter section 
than that supplied by the departmental plan. 
If, therefore, he chooses to accept the second 
transfer for registration, he can only do so on the 
assumption that the measurements shown on 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 51 

such plan are absolutely correct, in which case the 
two transfers, taken together, include all the land 
described in the original title, and the said title 
is cancelled in full accordingly. But we have 
seen that there is still one acre of land which is 
not included in either of the transfers and should 
still appear in the name, and on the title, of the 
original OTvuer. The result is that the title to the 
said 1 acre becomes latent for the time being and 
is very often lost altogether to the original owner, 
because the owners of the ^^ South half ^' and ^'the 
North 20.00 chains'' respectively may, in per- 
fectly good faith, occupy their respective proper- 
ties on either side of a common fence and thus, 
in time, acquire a title through undisturbed 
possession. 

Secondly, let us suppose that the North and 
South boundaries are still 40.00 chains in length, 
but that the meridian boundaries are each 39.50 
chains in length, — or 50 links short. Then the 
first parcel sold was 40.00 by 19.75 chains and 
contained 79 acres. The second transfer, describ- 
ing the remainder as the North 20.00 chains, in- 
cludes the North 25 links of the first described 
parcel, or 1 acre of land for which the transferrer 
has no title and, in respect to which the title 
subsequently issued to the transferee is spurious; 

As a further example let us take the case of a Example. 
city lot 50 by 100 feet of which the boundaries 



52 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

are due North and South or East and West, and 
of which a part has been already conveyed by 
description as ^Hhe West 15 feet of said lot.'' 
Since the actual size of the above lot is determined 
by the position of its corner posts, and it may be 
either 49 or 51 feet wide on the ground in fact, 
although the plan of subdivision shows it to be 
exactly 50 feet, it would be incorrect to describe 
the remainder as ^Hhe East 35 feet of said lot'' 
for the same reasons given in the preceding ex- 
ample. There are two ways of describing the 
remainder correctly: — 

(a). To describe it as the whole of said lot 
saving and excepting thereout and therefrom the 
West 15 feet thereof. 

(6). To describe it by metes and bounds in such 
a way as to exclude the West 15 feet; for in- 
stance — 

'^ Commencing at a point on the South bound- 
ary of said lot distant 15 feet Easterly from the 
South West comer thereof; Thence North and 
parallel to the West boundary of said lot 100 
feet more or less to the North boundary thereof; 
Thence East 35 feet more or less to the North 
East comer of said lot; Thence South along the 
East boundary of said lot 100 feet more or less 
to the South East comer thereof; Thence West 
35 feet more or less to the point of commence- 
ment," or, 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 53 

'^Commencing at the North East comer of 
said lot; Thence West along the North boundary 
of said lot 35 feet more or less to a point distant 
15 feet East of the North West corner thereof; 
Thence South and parallel to the West boundary 
of said lot 100 feet more or less to the South bound- 
ary thereof; Thence East, etc., etc.'' 



Description by Exception of Previously Con- 
veyed Parcels. 

Definition of 43. A description by exception is one of an 
a description Qj-jgij^^j parcel of land, out of which a part, or 

by exception. « j. 

parts, have been conveyed by description, ex- 
pressed in terms of the exceptions instead of in 
terms of the remainder. 
Description 44. From the above definition it follows that a 
by exception (description by exception is a negative description 
description, as opposed to a positive or direct description of 
the land to be conveyed, and on this accomit is 
not so good a form of description as a description 
by remainder. At the same time the use of 
descriptions by exception is unavoidable in some 
cases and allowable in many others. 
How de- 45. The creation of descriptions by exception 

scnptions by q(.(>^j.s through the conveyance of small parcels 

exception cd ^ x 

occur. which may make the remainder of the original 

parcel difiicult to describe directly, or, at least, 
makes it easier to describe by exception. For 
instance, suppose the case of a quarter section of 
land from which a parcel has been conveyed by 
description that lies entirely within the boundaries 
of such quarter section, the parcel being con- 
nected with one of said boundaries by description 

54 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 55 

of a survey tie. This is a case in which it is im- 
possible to describe the remainder otherwise than 
in terms of the excepted parcel. 

46. It will often be found that a parcel of land 
has been conveyed out of an original title by a 
description which is so loosely worded and faulty 
as to be ambiguous. In all such cases it is most 
desirable that the remainder should be described 
by exception, since any ambiguity in the descrip- 
tion of the part conveyed must necessarily be 
communicated to the remainder thus created. 

It is true that to describe the remainder by Faults in ti- 
exception perpetuates any ambiguity which may *^^^ cannot })e 

1 . eliminated 

exist, but it must be remembered that the duty by precise 
of the conveyancer is to describe that which ac- description of 
tually remains, and if such remainder includes 
any ambiguity of title such ambiguity must be 
accounted for in the description. 

In some cases a conveyancer will deliberately 
attempt, by precise description of the remainder, 
to rectify the ambiguity of title caused by a 
faulty description contained in a prior conveyance. 
Such an attempt is illogical and futile, because, 
if the ambiguity is of real effect it cannot be 
affected by the registration of an instrument 
subsequent to that of the one which caused it. 

47. The title to an original parcel of land, out 
of which a great many small parcels have been 
conveyed by description frequently becomes ob- 



56 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 



Titles by ex- 
ception of 
previously 
conveyed 
parcels often 
become ob- 
scure. 



Example. 



scure, and is only intelligible after many hours of 
careful work and plotting each of said small par- 
cels, as they are described, on a plan of the whole. 

This condition becomes greatly aggravated 
when the practice of describing exceptions from a 
title by reference to the number of the Certificate 
of Title issued for such exceptions is permitted 
by the Real Property Act of the province in which 
such land occurs. 

Take as an example the following description : — 
*^The whole of section 4 in Township 14, Range 12 
West of the 4th Meridian as the same is shown on 
a plan of survey of the said township approved 
and confirmed by the Surveyor General of Canada 
at Ottawa on the 17th day of January, 1907, 
which plan is of record in the Department of the 
Interior at Ottawa and in the Land Titles Office 
for the South Alberta Land Registration District 
saving and excepting thereout and therefrom: — 

'^ Firstly: — All those portions of said section 
comprised within the limits of a plan of subdivi- 
sion registered in said Land Titles Office mider 
number 2066 in Day Book 'M2^- 

'^Secondly: — A parcel of land containing One 
(1) and 77-100 acres be the same more or less 
being part of a public roadway as shown on a plan 
of survey of said roadway registered in said Land 
Titles Office under Road Plan number 279 and as 
described in Certificate of Title 14 Y.6. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 57 



<(i 



Thirdly: — All that portion containing 17 and 
36-100 acres be the same more or less taken for 
the Right of Way of the Canadian Pacific Railway 
as shown on a plan of said railway filed in said 
Land Titles Oflfice under Railway Plan Number 
738 and as described in Certificate of Title 117 
K.7. 

^'Fourthly: — All that portion of said section 
described in Certificate of Title 202 N.ll/' and 
so on until, in some cases, there are as many as 
twenty exceptions to which the original parcel 
referred to in the Certificate of Title is sub- 
ject. 

Such a description as the one contained in the 
above Certificate of Title is merely negative in 
effect. Instead of being a sufficient, complete and 
self contained description of the land included in 
the title, it depends for its validity on evidence 
contained in a number of instruments outside of 
itself. It defines the position and limits of the 
original parcel but, regarded as an individual 
document, conveys no assurance that any of such 
parcel is left after all the various exceptions have 
been satisfied. 

The existence of every title of this kind is a 
source of danger and embarrassment to registrar 
and owner alike, because it is impossible to loiow 
just what it contains without doing a great deal 
of careful work which, however carefully done, 



58 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

involves a greater risk of serious error than or- 
dinarily good conveyancing should do. 
How to The only possible remedy is simple but expen- 

reme y o - ^j^^ ^^^ cousists in taking the following three 

scurc tritics. 

steps: — 

(a). To have a survey made of the entire 
original parcel and each of the parcels conveyed 
thereout by description. 

(b). To register a plan of such survey, showing 
clearly the boundaries of each and every excepted 
parcel and showing the portions still remaining 
in the title as numbered or lettered blocks. 

(c). To make application to the registrar to 
cancel the existing title by exception and to issue 
instead thereof a new title for such numbered or 
lettered blocks, thus converting a negative title 
by exception into a positive title by direct de- 
scription. 



survey. 



Descriptions of Railway Right of Way. 

48. Descriptions of railway right of way should Descriptions 
almost invariably be drawn so as to depend di- ^! railway 

right of way 

rectly on a sufficient plan of survey — either at- must depend 
tached to the instrument containing the descrip- ^^ "suffi- 
tion or of previous record. That is to say that no 
attempt should be made to describe the land by 
metes and bounds other than by reference to the 
centre line of the railway as shown on such plan. 
The reason for the above statement may be 
found in the fact that the majority of right of 
way descriptions are complicated, as defined in 
section 13, in that the boundaries described con- 
sist of a succession of tangents and curves. More- 
over these tangents and curves are actually sur- 
veyed and measured along the centre line of the 
railway, whereas the boundaries themselves, on 
which the corresponding tangents are of different 
lengths and the corresponding curves have differ- 
ent radii and lengths, are not surveyed at all, but 
calculated in reference to the survey of said centre 
line. It follows therefore that the measurements 
given in a description by metes and bounds of a 
right of way are calculated instead of having been 
measured on the ground, and are more subject 
to error than if taken from actual survey data. 

59 



60 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

Another objection to descriptions by metes and 
bounds of railway right of way is that it is not 
possible to realize the position of the land de- 
scribed without a plan, and, if the description be 
also made subject to a sufficient plan of survey 
there is no object in describing the land by metes 
and bounds at all, for the plan is then an integral 
part of the description. In fact any description 
of land in which the facts of survey on which it is 
based are presented in a dual manner, as in the 
case of a description by metes and bounds which 
is also made subject to a plan of survey, contains 
in itself this element of weakness — that any 
discrepancy between the measurements shown on 
the plan and those contained in the written de- 
scription must often remain unaccountable. We 
have seen, for instance, that it is neither necessary 
nor desirable in describing a quarter section ac- 
cording to the departmental plan of survey of the 
township in which it occurs to refer to the measure- 
ments of its boundaries; or, in describing a town 
lot according to the plan of survey of the sub- 
division containing it to refer to the measure- 
ments of such lot. 

49. Since descriptions of right of way must 
depend directly on the registered plan of survey 
of such right of way, it is essential that such plan 
shall be a '^sufficient'' plan of survey, as defined 
in section 5. Given such a plan it is usual to 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 61 

describe right of way as shown in the following 
example: — ''All that part of the South East Example, 
quarter of Section Twenty (20) in Township Forty- 
six (46) Range Twenty-three (23) West of the 
Fourth (4th) Meridian in the Province of Alberta 
as the same is shown on a plan of survey of said 
township approved and confirmed by the Surveyor 
General of Canada at Ottawa on the 14th day of 
May, 1894, which plan is of record in the Depart- 
ment of the Interior at Ottawa and in the Land 
Titles Office for the North Alberta Land Registra- 
tion District at Edmonton in said Province which 
is taken for the Right of Way of the Canadian 
Pacific Railway and lies between two lines drawn 
parallel to and perpendicularly distant fifty (50) 
feet from and on opposite sides of the centre line 
of said railway as the same is shown on a plan of 
survey of said railway crossing said land and lands 
adjoining the same registered in said Land Titles 
Office under number 2037 in Day Book 'P' and 
as said railway is now constructed on the ground, 
the land herein described containing Six (6) and 
66-100 acres more or less and as shown colored 
red on said plan of railway.'' 

There are several points in the above descrip- 
tion which are worth considering — 

(a). Since railway right of way constitutes a 
special form of land titles, and the land conveyed 
is, as a rule, devoted to the one purpose, it may be 



62 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

good practical conveyancing to describe right of 
way as being "taken for the Right of Way of 
the Canadian Pacific Railway'' with a view to 
giving it general distinctive description. In 
theory however, the practice is incorrect. There 
is absolutely no difference between the title which 
a railway corporation acquires to its right of way 
and any other title to land, and to describe it in 
reference to its present or future use is as if a 
city lot were described as "being acquired for the 
purpose of erecting a livery barn thereon,'' which 
part of the description would be superfluous at any 
time and would become more apparently so if the 
land were used for some entirely different purpose. 
(6). The words "crossing said land and lands 
adjoining the same" are necessary because, since 
the right of way is described in reference to the 
perpendicular distance of its boundaries from the 
centre line, the projection of said centre line be- 
yond the actual boundaries of the parcel of land 
containing the right of way being described must 
be allowed for. For instance, suppose a point of 
curve of the centre line to fall exactly on a bound- 
ary between two parcels of land; there will then 
be a part of the boundary of the right of way in 
each of said parcels which will be neither parallel 
to nor perpendicularly distant fifty feet from the 
centre line as it is shown within the limits of said 
parcel. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 63 

(c). The words '^and as such railway is now 
constructed on the grounds/' or words to the same 
effect, are inserted by a good many corporation 
lawyers in the forms of transfer prepared by them 
for the use of railway companies, with a view to 
safeguarding the company from the effects of 
trespass committed through misdescription of its 
right of way. Owing to the insufficient character 
of many railway plans on which descriptions of 
right of way have been based, it is no infrequent 
occurrence for subsequent and more careful sur- 
vey to reveal the fact that the land occupied and 
fenced in by the company does not agree with that 
described in its title;* i. e., that the company is 
trespassing, and it is this trespass which the use 
of the above words is intended to purge. 

It is possible that the use of the above words 
may have something of the intended effect as 
against the owner of the land who executed the 
original transfer — he being still the owner of the 
remainder — in that such owner might conceiv- 
ably be ordered by a court to fulfil the evident 
intention of the faulty transfer by executing a 
new one in lieu of it, but it is impossible to believe 
that the insertion of said words in a transfer, 
wherein the land also purports to be precisely 
described in reference to the measurements sho\\Ti 
on a registered plan, can have any effect on the 

* See section 18. 



64 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

title that issues from said transfer. If the latter 
were the case, it would mean one of two things: 
either that the land conveyed was that occupied 
by the company at the date of the transfer, 
whether such occupation were determined by the 
theoretical width on either side of the centre of 
the actual track or in regard to the position of the 
fences — matters, in either case, which it would 
be impossible to establish the truth in regard to 
after a few years — or else it might be construed 
to mean that the land conveyed was that occupied 
by the company at any present time, or in other 
words that every time a portion of the track were 
re-constructed, a curve flattened or new fences 
erected the land conveyed by the title would vary 
accordingly, and would therefore be indeter- 
minate. 

In the absence of any judicial decisions on the 
point, either of the above alternatives appears to 
be preposterous. 

It may therefore be accepted as an unestab- 
lished rule that the words '^and as such railway 
is now constructed on the ground'' should not be 
inserted in descriptions of right of way, and that, 
if they are so inserted in transfers, registrars 
should at least see that they are not included in 
the description of right of way contained in cer- 
tificates of title issuing from said transfers. 

(d). One difliculty in regard to the above form 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 65 

of description is that it is practically impossible 
to include in such a description all the extra land 
which a railway company requires beyond its 
mere right of way for station grounds, wyes, 
sidings, extra wide cuts or fills, borrow pits, water 
tanks, snow fences or sheds or other purposes con- 
nected with the railway. The consequence is that 
separate descriptions have to be made for all these 
as occasion requires. With the exception of sta- 
tion grounds, all the extra land so required is 
generally of so small a monetary value that the 
company can hardly be expected to have a sepa- 
rate survey made of each — which survey would 
probably cost three or four times as much as the 
company is required to pay for the land itself — ■ 
and the result is that these parcels are also de- 
scribed in reference to the position of the centre 
line. Such descriptions are often very involved 
but must be accepted as one of the weaknesses 
of the above form of description. 

50. While the method of describing right of Method of 
way referred to in the preceding section is almost ^^^cn^i^s 

^ . right of way 

universally employed at the present time, there as lettered 
is another method sometimes used which is dis- ^^^cks shown 
tinctly better but has the one disadvantage that 
it requires a more complete survey of the land 
described. This method consists in showing the 
land required for all railway purposes as lettered 
blocks on the registered plan of survey of the right 



66 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

of way, and describing them in the same way that 
city lots are described; i. e., without direct refer- 
ence to any of the measurements shown on the 
plan but simply by reference to the lettered 
block considered as a separate parcel of land, 
and the registration marks of the plan. For 
instance: — 
Example. '^All that part of the South East quarter of 

section Twenty (20) in Township Forty-six (46) 
Range Twenty-three (23) West of the Fourth 
(4th) Meridian in the Province of Alberta as the 
same is shown on a plan of survey of said township 
approved and confirmed by the Surveyor General 
of Canada at Ottawa on the 14th day of May, 
1894, which plan is of record in the Department 
of the Interior at Ottawa and in the Land Titles 
Office for the North Alberta Land Registration 
District at Edmonton in said Province Being 
C. P. R. Block No. 1 containing Six and sixty-six 
hundredths (6 66-100) acres be the same more or 
less and as said Block is shown colored red on a 
plan of survey of the Canadian Pacific Railway 
right of way registered in said Land Titles Office 
under number 2037 in Day Book ' P. ' 

One advantage in the above form is that it 
could be made to include all extra right of way 
shown on the original plan, either as part of 
'^C. P. R. Block No. 1'' or as ^'C. P. R. Blocks 
Nos. 2, 3, 4, etc." 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 67 

Another advantage is that it is somewhat 
shorter and more simple although it depends no 
more directly on the plan than the form in the 
preceding section. 



Exception of Minerals in Descriptions of Land. 



Land includes 
minerals un- 
derlying the 
same. 



Land titles 
Bubject to 
reservations 
mentioned in 
Crown grants. 



51. Since the theory of title to land is that such 
title includes not only the surface but all that 
underlies it, it follows that all mineral deposits, 
underlying land would be included in a perfect 
allodial title to such land. As a matter of fact 
there are comparatively few such titles in exist- 
ence. There are rare cases where grants for land 
have been issued by the Crown without any reser- 
vation whatever, as, for instance, some of the 
earlier grants issued by the Government of the 
Crown Colony of British Columbia, which con- 
veyed all minerals — precious or otherwise. The 
Dominion Lands Act however, always excluded 
gold and silver from the rights conveyed by Crown 
Grant to land, and has also excluded coal and 
petroleum for some years past. 

Thus we see that there are certain reservations 
and exceptions to most land titles created by the 
conditions of the original grant from the Crown. 
However, there are very many existing titles which 
include the base minerals, and it is frequently 
required to except coal for instance from the opera- 
tion of a conveyance transferring the land which 
overlays it. This is effected by adding to the end 

68 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 69 

of the description contained in such conveyance 
the words ''Saving and excepting thereout and 
therefrom all coal which may be in or under said 
land and the right to mine the same'' or other 
words to that effect. 

It will frequently happen that a person trans- Restrictivo 
ferring land but retaining the coal rights will ^^^^^^^.^^ i" 

^ ^ " ... descriptions 

want to have included in the description articles to be avoided, 
of agreement as to his right of entry upon the land 
for the purpose of mining said coal. Such articles 
would constitute a restrictive covenant in the 
title and, therefore, should not be inserted in the 
description of the land to be transferred, but 
should be embodied in a separate form of agree- 
ment between the parties which could be regis- 
tered against the title. 

Note. — If the fee simple of an entire parcel of 
land is transferred ''saving and excepting thereout 
and therefrom all coal which may be in or under 
said land, etc.'' the apparent effect is to create a 
fee simple for the remainder — in tliis case the 
coal. This is of course impossible, but a separate 
title to the coal is certainly created in such a case. 
I am writing of the practice of conveyance by 
description as I know it to be — and the case 
stated is quite common practice — but my owti 
opinion would be that it is improper to create a 
title for coal apart from the land which overlays 
it, and that all transactions in regard to coal should 
be in the form of lease and should follow the title 
to the land in the same way that an unredeemed 



70 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

mortgage does. For instance it is my opinion that 
a vendor desiring to retain coal rights should 
transfer the coal with the land and receive back 
from the vendee a reciprocal lease of the coal 
rights to be registered against said vendee^s title 
when issued. 



Interpretation of Faulty Descriptions of Land. 

52. A description of land should be drawn in 
such a way that it is capable of only one possible 
interpretation. 

Unfortunately there are many descriptions of Existence of 
land which contain inherent errors in construe- ^^.^f. ^^" 

scnptions 

tion and in the mathematical data given in regard which are 
to the various boundaries of the land described, ^nevertheless 

, . , 1 1 r. /. . 1 bases of title. 

which nevertheless form the base of title to such 
land. It therefore becomes necessary to consider 
the question of how to interpret a faulty descrip- 
tion in laying out, or otherwise dealing with, the 
land described or lands adjacent thereto. If the 
land conveyed by a faulty description is of suffi- interpreta- 
cient value, and the parties affected cannot agree V^^ ^^ faulty 

, descriptions 

upon an interpretation of such description that is by a judge, 
mutually satisfactory, it is often necessary to ap- 
ply to the courts for an interpretation thereof. 
A Judge has power to take evidence into con- 
sideration and issue an order accordingly. In 
the case of registrars, conveyancers^ surveyors 
and others who have occasion to deal with faulty 
descriptions, and who do not have the power of 
discretion vested in a Judge, it may be laid down 
as a general rule that ''When dealing with a 

71 



72 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

Descriptions faulty description it is only permissible to take 
to be followed -j^^^ consideration the mere technical facts pre- 

in order of 

construction, sented in the description as written m the order 
in which they are written." 

Example. 53. For instance, suppose a part of a quarter 

section to be described as follows: — ^^Commenc- 
ing at the North East comer of said quarter sec- 
tion; Thence South along the East boundary of 
said quarter section a distance of 2,000 feet to a 
point (A) Thence North 60° 00' West a distance 
of 3,049 feet more or less to a point on the West 
boundary of said quarter section; (B) Thence 
North along said West boundary a distance of 
376 feet more or less to the North West comer of 
said quarter section; (C) Thence East along the 
North boundary of said quarter section a distance 
of 2,640 feet more or less to the point of commence- 
ment." 

On plotting the above description it will be 
found that when the position of the point (B) has 
been determined in accordance with the descrip- 
tion of the course A-B, the distance from (B) to 
(C) is in reality 476 feet instead of 376 feet as 
described. The description is therefore faulty in 
that it will not close because the correlation of 
the various courses as described is mathematically 
impossible. Either the bearing of A-B is correct 
and the distance B-C as given in the description 
is wrong, or the distance B-C as given in the 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 73 

description is correct and the bearing of A-B 
must be disregarded. Neglecting the possibiUty 
that both distance and bearing are incorrect, and 
following the general rule above stated, there can 
be no doubt that the bearing given for A-B must 
be accepted as correct, since the first two courses 
described are correct in themselves and are not 
subject to that which follows. 

Of course there is a certain amount of internal Departure 
evidence contained in such a description which ^^J^ genera 

•^ rule some- 

may be strong enough to justify a departure from times justi- 

the general rule: For instance, supposing the dis- ^^^ by mter- 

, 7 X J. o j^^j evidence 

tance given for A-B to have been 3,099.4 feet of description, 
more or less, which equals cosecant 58° 25' X Example. 
2,640 and which would agree with the distance of 
376 feet given for B-C, and that the area of the 
parcel is given as being 72 acres which would 
also agree with said distance, the weight of evi- 
dence would tend to disprove the correctness of 
the bearing given for A-B and to show that the 
distance of 376 feet given for B-C was correct. 

As a matter of fact, in any case where the dis- 
crepancy is so marked as in the above example, 
it would be very unsafe to assume either inter- 
pretation of the description; the only proper 
course would be to remedy the description itself 
either by re-conveyance on the part of the regis- 
tered owners of the land, or by obtaining an order 
of the court to that effect. 



74 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

It may be noted that if the course A-B had 
been described so as to read '^Thence North 
60'' 00' West a distance of 3,049 feet more or 
less to a point on the West boundary of said 
quarter section distant 376 feet from the North 
West comer thereof,'' there would be no dis- 
crepancy, because the bearing, though incorrect, 
would be subject to the position of two clearly 
defined points and would be manifestly wrong. 



Preamble of a Description of Land. 

54. For use in all cases where it may seem ad- 
visable, the following is a good form of preamble 
which is sometimes used in descriptions of land: 
^^All and singular that certain parcel or tract of Formofpre- 

1 J 1 . 'x X 1 • 1 i_ • • xi amble some- 

land and premises situate lying and being in the ^^^^ ^^^^ 

Province of Alberta in the Dominion of Canada 

comprising part of the South East quarter of 

Section Twenty (20) in Township Fourteen (14) 

Range Twelve (12) West of the Fourth (4th) 

Meridian as the same is shown on a plan of survey 

of said township approved and confirmed by the 

Surveyor General of Canada at Ottawa on the 

14th day of May, 1894, and which may be more 

particularly described as follows, that is to say: — " 

In ordinary practice however, the use of such Above form 

a form is cumbersome and unnecessary. For y^^^^^^sary 

*^ in ordmary 

instance many Real Property Acts define the cases, 
meaning of the word ''land'' in the interpretation 
clauses of the Act to mean ''lands, messuages, 
tenement, and hereditaments, corporeal and in- 
corporeal, of every nature and description, and 
every estate or interest therein, etc., etc." It 
follows, therefore, that when conveying land held 
under the provisions of such an act it is quite 

75 



76 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

unnecessary to include the words '^and prem- 
ises/' 
General form As a general rule it is quite sufficient to com- 
o pream e. j^^j^^^^ ^ description ^^All that portion of the 
South East quarter, etc.'' 



Examples of Descriptions of Land with Explana- 
tory Notes. 

55. The following example is a description of a 
city lot together with an easement over the East 
14 inches of the lot immediately adjoining the 
same on the West side thereof, which easement is 
created by the previous registration of a party 
wall agreement and is appurtenant to the lot 
described. The boundaries of both lots are shown 
to be due North and South or East and West 
on the registered plan of subdivision. 

'^The whole of Lot numbered Thirteen (13) 
in Block numbered Seventy-one (71) in the City 
of Calgary in the Province of Alberta in the 
Dominion of Canada as the same is shown on a 
plan of subdivision of a part of said City regis- 
tered in the Land Titles Office for the South 
Alberta Land Registration District in said City 
under number 2133 in Day Book ^S' together 
with an easement over the East Fourteen (14) 
inches of lot numbered Twelve (12) in said Block 
for the purposes specifically mentioned in an 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 77 

instrument registered in said Land Titles Office 
under number 249 in Day Book 'R\'' 



Notes. 

(a). The effect of the registration of instrument 
249 R was to register a charge or encumbrance 
against the Certificate of Title for Lot 12 and a 
corresponding entry on the Certificate of Title 
for Lot 13 making the easement appurtenant 
thereto. 

(b). In some cases conveyancers define the pur- 
poses and conditions of the easement in the body 
of the description, thus making the description 
more complete and self contained. 1 prefer the 
method of reference to the registered instrument 
creating the easement as eliminating all possibility 
of discrepancy between the terms of the ease- 
ment as expressed in the description and as 
actually provided in the registered instrument. 
Also the terms and conditions mentioned in the 
registered instrument are frequently irrelevant 
to a description of land, and their inclusion in a 
description intended to be inserted in a Certificate 
of Title would tend to obscure the real facts of 
such title 

56. The following example illustrates the parti- 
tion by description of two city lots, and is based 
on the facts of an actual case: — 



78 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 




Lots 1 and 2 as shown in the jBgure were origi- 
nally owned by A. A first sold to B the part de- 
scribed as follows : — 

'^All those portions of Lots numbered One (1) 
and Two (2) in Block numbered Five (5) in the 
City of Edmonton in the Province of Alberta in 
the Dominion of Canada as the same are shown 
on a plan of subdivision of part of said city regis- 
tered in the Land Titles Office for the North 
Alberta Land Registration District in said City 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 79 

under number 14 in Day Book 'X' which may be 
more particularly described as follows: — 

'^Commencing at the North West comer of said 
Lot 1 : Thence South along the West boundary of 
said lot Seventy (70) feet to a point; Thence 
Easterly and parallel to the Northerly boundaries 
of said lots 1 and 2 to a point on the Easterly 
boundary of said lot 2; Thence Northerly along 
said Easterly boundary to the North East corner 
of said lot 2; Thence Westerly along the Northerly 
boundary of said lots 2 and 1 ninety-five (95) 
feet more or less to the point of commence- 
ment/' 

A then sold to C ''All these portions of Lots 
numbered One (1) and Two (2) etc., . . . 
which may be described as the most Southerly 
Eighty (80) feet throughout of said lots." 

B erected a six story modem block completely 
covering the most Northerly 70 feet of said lots 
measured perpendicularly from the Northerly 
boundary thereof. 

A discovered that the part sold by him to B 
as described above, only contained 69.6 feet meas- 
ured perpendicularly from the Northerly bound- 
ary of said lots, and demanded payment for the 
remaining four-tenths of a foot. 

On a careful resurvey of the lots being made it 
was discovered that they were two-tenths of a 
foot longer, measured along the First Street 



80 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

frontage, than the measurement shown on the 
registered plan, and B was obhged, on advice of 
his counsel, to pay to A a sum of $1,000, for the 
six-tenths of a foot still remaining in A's title. 

Notes* 

(a). The description of the part sold by A to 
B was a perfectly good description in itself, but 
was misunderstood by B and his agents. On 
the other hand it did not carry out the evident 
intention of the parties to divide the land into 
two parts having perpendicular depths of 70 and 
80 feet respectively. 

(6). It is important to note that all the parties 
involved were bound by the actual terms of the 
description contained in the transfer from A to 
B, in spite of A's evident intention to dispose of 
the whole of his property by the two transfers to 
B and C respectively, and in spite of the fact that 
the registrar had erroneously cancelled his title 
in full on the registration of the second transfer 
to C some years previously, and that A's title had 
therefore been latent for such time. 

(c). The description of the land sold by A to C 
was loosely and incorrectly drawn, but its intent 
was admitted by both A and C to mean ^Hhe 
most Southerly 80 feet of the lots measured per- 
pendicularly from the Southerly boundary 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 81 

thereof. For a proper method of description of 
this part see Sections 41 and 42 (a) and (6). 

57. In connection with the description of lots 
as sho^vn on plans of subdivision of lands lying 
outside of, but comparatively near to, the limits 
of an incorporated city or town, it is very common 
practice to describe the whole subdivision by some 
high sounding name as a ^^ suburb of or '^ an addi- 
tion to" such city or town. For instance: — ^^Lot 
numbered One (1) in Block numbered Forty-six 
(46) in Marlborough Heights being an addition 
to the to^vnsite of Orwell as the same is shown, 
etc.'' 

It is almost unnecessary to say that this prac- 
tice emanates from real estate offices rather than 
from the law courts. 

A subdivision within the limits of a city or 
town is a part of said city or town. 

A subdivision outside such limits is not a part 
of such city or town. It is merely a subdivision 
of a parcel of land which may never be incor- 
porated within the limits of an adjacent town and 
can only be properly identified by the legal de- 
scription of the land itself. Moreover, it is not 
practically possible to establish a limit of distance 
beyond city limits within which a subdivision 
may be termed '^an addition'' or ^^a suburb", and 
when such a subdivision happens to be five miles 
beyond city limits, either of the above terms is 



82 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

obviously misleading. Therefore the description 
of all lots situated in subdivisions outside the 
limits of an incorporated city or town should be 
described as follows: — 

^^Lot numbered One (1) in Block numbered 
Thirteen (13) as the same is shown on a plan of 
subdivision of part of the South East quarter of 
Section Fourteen (14) in Township Forty-one (41) 
Range Thirteen (13) West of the Fourth (4th) 
Meridian in the Province of Alberta in the do- 
minion of Canada which plan is registered in the 
Land Titles Office for the North Alberta Land 
Registration District at Edmonton in said Prov- 
ince under number 7144 in Day Book 'K. ' '' 

58. The following example is a description of 
part of a quarter section bounded on the West and 
South by the boundaries of the quarter section, 
on the North by the High Water Mark of the 
North Saskatchewan River and on the East by 
the Westerly boundary of a registered townsite, 
which however does not extend to said High 
Water Mark:— 

'^All that part of the North West quarter of 
Section Twenty-three (23) in Township Forty- 
two (42) Range Fourteen (14) West of the Fourth 
(4th) Meridian in the Province of Alberta in the 
Dominion of Canada as the same is shown on a 
plan of survey of said township approved and con- 
firmed by the Surveyor General of Canada at 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 83 

Ottawa on the 18th day of July, 1907, which plan 
is of record in the Department of the Interior 
at Ottawa and in the Land Titles Office for the 
North Alberta Land Registration District at 
Edmonton in said Province and which may be 
more particularly described as follows: — Com- 
mencing at the South West comer of said quarter 
section; Thence Easterly along the Southerly 
boundary of said quarter section Eighteen hun- 
dred and sixty-four (1864) feet more or less to the 
intersection of said boundary with the Westerly 
boundary of Elm Street as the same is shown on 
a plan of subdivision registered in said Land 
Titles Office under number 4173 in Day Book 
'AM'; Thence North along said West boundary 
of Elm Street, and said West boundary produced 
Northerly, Fourteen hundred and twenty (1420) 
feet more or less to the High Water Mark of the 
North Saskatchewan River; Thence Westerly and 
following said High Water Mark in an upstream 
direction to its intersection with the West bound- 
ary of said quarter section; Thence South along 
said West boundary One thousand and ninety- 
four (1094) feet more or less to the South West 
comer of said quarter section and point of com- 
mencement the part herein described containing 
approximately Fifty-three (53) acres be the same 
more or less/' 



84 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

Notes. 

(a). All the distances in this description are 
''more or less'' in accordance with the rule laid 
do^^Ti in section 27. 

(b). The acreage given is qualified by the use 
of the word '^approximately'' in accordance with 
the rule laid down in section 22. 

59. The following example is a description of 
part of a quarter section bounded on the South 
by the right of way of the Grand Trunk Pacific 
Railway: — 

''All that part of the North East quarter of 
Section Twenty-one (21) in Township Forty- 
nine (49) Range Seventeen (17) West of the Fourth 
(4th) Meridian in the Province of Alberta in the 
Dominion of Canada as the same is shown on a 
plan of survey of said township approved and 
confirmed by the Surveyor General of Canada 
at Ottawa on the 11th day of October, 1903, which 
plan is of record in the Department of the In- 
terior at Ottawa and in the Land Titles Office for 
the North Alberta Land Registration District at 
Edmonton in said Province which lies to the 
North of the Northerly limit of the right of way 
of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway as the same 
is shown on a plan of survey of said right of way 
registered in said Land Titles Office under num- 
ber 14444 in Day Book 'L'." 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 85 

Notes. 

(a). No acreage is mentioned in the description 
because the description is not made subject to 
an explanatory plan of survey, nor is the acreage 
shown on the railway plan referred to, and, with- 
out the assurance afforded by a surveyors' certif- 
icate, a registrar would be justified in refusing to 
accept the conveyance if it showed a specified 
acreage, since he could have no means of knowing 
whether it was correct or not. (See Section 13.) 

(6). A very common mistake is to describe such 
a parcel as the above as "lying to the North of 
the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway'' without es- 
tablishing the position of the railway by reference 
to a particular plan. Since there are probably 
at least two plans of such railway of record in the 
Land Titles Office, which do not as a rule agree 
exactly with one another, and since it is quite 
possible that the land actually occupied and 
fenced in by the railway company does not cor- 
respond with that shown on either plan, it follows 
that such a description is inadmissible in that it 
lacks clearness and definition. 

60. It is frequently desired to describe the 
limit of a right of way as a boundary of a parcel 
of land before any sufficient plan of such right of 
way has been registered. In the Provinces of 
Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta at least a 



86 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

registrar must refuse to recognize the limit of a 
right of way as established until a sufficient plan 
of survey has been filed or registered, so that any 
absolute transfer of land based on the position 
of right of way — considered as such — would be 
unregisterable until such time. However, such 
descriptions are frequently required to be made for 
insertion in interim agreements of sale, etc., and 
the following example is a description by metes 
and bounds of the parcel otherwise described in 
the preceding section: — 

"All that part of the North East quarter of 
Section Twenty-one (21) in Township Forty- 
nine (49) Range Seventeen (17) West of the 
Fourth (4th) Meridian in the Province of Alberta 
in the Dominion of Canada as the same is shown 
on a plan of survey of said township approved 
and confirmed by the Surveyor General of Canada 
at Ottawa on the 11th day of October, 1903, 
which plan is of record in the Department of the 
Interior at Ottawa and in the Land Titles Office 
for the North Alberta Land Registration District 
at Edmonton in said Province and which may be 
more particularly described as follows: — 

''Commencing at the North East comer of 
said quarter section; Thence on an assumed 
bearing of due South along the Easterly boundary 
of said quarter section a distance of Eighteen 
hundred and thirty decimal point seven (1830.7) 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 87 

feet to a point; Thence North 65"" 00' West a 
distance of Fifteen hundred and twenty-nine 
(1529) feet to a point; Thence on a curve to the 
right having a constant radius of Fifteen hundred 
and nineteen (1519) feet from a centre lying in a 
direction of North 25° 00' East from the last 
mentioned point a distance of Three hundred and 
ninety-seven decimal point six seven (397.67) 
feet; Thence North 50° 00' West a distance of 
Twelve hundred (1200) feet more or less to inter- 
sect the West boundary of said quarter section; 
Thence North along said West boundary Two 
hundred feet more or less to the North West 
comer of said quarter section; Thence due East 
along the North boundary of said quarter section 
Twenty-six hundred and forty (2640) feet more 
or less to the North East corner of said quarter 
section and point of commencement/' 

61. There is an example of an ordinary descrip- 
tion of railway right of way given in section 49. 
As these descriptions only vary as to the land of 
which the right of way forms a part, the width 
of the right of way and the registration data of 
the railway plan on which they are based, no 
further example need be given here. 

62. The following example is a description of 
additional right of way required by the railway 
company after it has acquired title to the right 
of way shown on its registered plan of survey of 



88 DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 

the same; the preamble may be assumed to be 
the same as that given for the description con- 
tained in section 60: — '^Commencing at the 
point of intersection of the Northerly limit of the 
right of way of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway 
as said right of way is shown on a plan of survey 
thereof registered in said Land Titles Office under 
number 1167 in Day Book 'P' with a line drawn 
at right angles to the centre line of said railway 
as shown on said plan from a point distant Thir- 
teen hundred and seven (1307) feet Westerly 
from the intersection of said centre line with the 
Easterly boundary of said quarter section; Thence 
Westerly and following said Northerly limit a 
distance of Six hundred and sixty (660) feet to a 
point; Thence North Easterly on a line drawn at 
right angles to the tangent to the curve at that 
point a distance of Sixty-six (66) feet to a point; 
Thence Easterly and parallel throughout to said 
Northerly limit a distance of Six himdred and 
sixty-one (661) feet more or less to a point distant 
Sixty-six (66) feet from the point of commence- 
ment in a line drawn at right angles to the said 
Northerly limit at that point; Thence in a straight 
line Sixty-six feet to said point of commencement 
the part herein described containing One (1) acre 
be the same more or less and as shown colored 
red on an attached copy of part of said plan.'' 
(a). It will be noted that the above description 



DESCRIPTIONS OF LAND 89 

is not self contained but depends in a secondary- 
manner on the plan of the survey of adjacent 
land. This constitutes a defect which is un- 
avoidable unless a separate survey of the parcel 
is made, and a plan thereof attached to the de- 
scription and made a part of it. As the value of the 
1 acre contained is probably only $15.00 or $20.00, 
whereas the cost to the company of having a 
special survey made at an out of the way part of 
their line might easily amount to $100.00, such 
descriptions of additional right of way are very 
commonly used. 



DEC 4 1913 



'HE following pages contain advertisements of a 
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Clothy 200 pp., 8vo, $1.75 net 

A comparison of the units of weight, measure, currency, 
mining area, etc., of different countries; together with tables, 
constants and other data useful to mining engineers and sur- 
veyors. 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 



BOOKS ON CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The Theory and Practice of Bridge Con- 
struction in Timber, Iron and Steel 

By morgan W. DAVIES 

London, 1908. 

Cloth, 5g4 pp., i2mo, $3.50 net 

The aim of this work is primarily to furnish easily understood 
rules whereby problems connected with Bridge Construction 
may be treated analytically and graphically. Examples are 
given of the various types of existing bridges constructed either 
of timber or of steel. In every instance the calculations and 
designs are set out step by step in their development and the 
illustrations have been reproduced from the actual working 
drawings. 

Moving Loads on Railway Underbridges 

Including Diagrams of Bending Moments and Shearing 
Forces, and Tables of Equivalent Uniform Live Loads. 

By harry BAMFORD, M.Sc, A. M. Inst. C. E. 

London, 1907. 

Cloth, yS pp., Svo, $1.25 net 

By a direct application of the funicular polygon, the author 
has succeeded in devising a graphical method, whereby on a 
single diagram, the maximum shears and the maximum bend- 
ing moments and the points along the spans at which they 
occur can be determined with facility for a wide range of 
spans and for any given type-train. The book will prove use- 
ful to engineering students in general and to designers of rail- 
way underbridges in particular. 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 



BOOKS ON CIVIL ENGINEERING 

Simplified Methods of Calculating Rein- 
forced Concrete Beams 

By W. noble TWELVETREES, M. I. Mech. E., A. M. L 
E. E., M. R. S. I. 
London, 1909. 

Paper J 20 pp., III., i2mo, $ .20 net 

The Practical Design of Reinforced Concrete 
Beams and Columns 

By W. noble TWELVETREES 

With Labor-saving Diagrams and Numerous Illustrations. 
London, 191 1. 

Cloth, 164 pp., III., i2mo, $2.00 net 

The author has confined his attention chiefly to the presenta- 
tion of formulae, simple working rules, and labor-saving dia- 
grams, intended to facilitate the work of designing reinforced 
concrete structures. 

The treatment throughout is applicable to all rational sys- 
tems of construction and all varieties of reinforcing bars. The 
work is a thoroughly practical guide. 

Structural Iron and Steel 

A Text-book for Architects, Engineers, Builders and Science 
Students. 

By W. noble TWELVETREES 

London, 1900. 

Cloth, 266 pp., ismo, $i.go net 

In this elementary treatise the author presents in regular 
sequence the more important details relative to iron and steel 
as applied to structural work. 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 



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